[cfcf14]

Hey, I noticed that you explicitly mentioned that you found a female md that was the one to ultimately make the correct diagnosis. Do you feel that the previous md's (males?) were unwilling to consider they should conduct a tick panel due to bias? I ask because my partner has had comparable resistance for a very different ailment and I'm interested in possible systemic errors occurring.

[areoform]

Yes, male doctors often don't listen to women. Speaking from both personal experience and the experience of almost every other woman I know.

Medicine is a horribly antiquated and biased field. It's one of the few fields that need to be automated.

[Auracle]

I’m sure that can happen, but please don’t just to that conclusion just because of sex differences. I’m a man and I’ve had plenty of male doctors not listen to me as well, along with one or two very dismissive female doctors.

It’s a profession that attracts know-it-alls along with those that actually want to help but are overworked.

[lamby]

Very true, but when there's literally 100s of years of women's legitimate medical complaints being dismissed (sometimes with fatal consequences), it is surely not too much of leap to speculate that this is part of the reason.

[robocat]

It is very rude to deny that areoform and Coolerbythelake have read their situations correctly.

Perhaps female doctor are more likely to listen better (to men or women).

Sexism is a well recognised problem in medicine - a little googling shows a lot of research into the problem. Here is one article referencing some research with how women are treated for heart attacks: https://www.salon.com/2018/12/14/new-research-reveals-how-se...

[Lammy]

I wonder if that type of bias could be some result of the way medical schools structure the courses training our doctors, or if medicine is just a universal enough human need that it exposes bias inherent in all areas of our society.

[haldujai]

Physician bias that women and people of colour are “tougher” is real. We are educated about it and are improving but as with bias against these classes of individuals everywhere else in life, we have come a long way but we are not perfect.

Most current medical schools (at least reputable ones) provides extensive training on this matter.

[formerkrogemp]

Different regions of the country have worse biases as well.