A study in Pitchbook (to which I am unable to direct you more efficiently) highlighted by dezeen’s wonderfully interesting online magazine, today, says only 4% of health care research and development funding goes into women’s health WORLDWIDE.
Considering there are slightly more than 50% of women on the planet, this is a shocking shortfall!
That's interesting. It would be helpful to know the percentage spent on men's health too. Suppose it was 4%, and the remaining 92% of health spending applied to everyone, it wouldn't be so bad.
I don't believe research on men's health is only 4% of the total. The amount spent on just erectile dysfunction must be huge.
The second paragraph of this link tells us what women are up against.
theguardian.com/education/2...
The reference to searing pain in getting a hysteroscopy (first sentence of article) is no surprise to me. I found it was like being tortured - so agonising that I couldn't believe that this was being done to me.
Yep, uterine biopsy was excruciating. When I asked in advance about pain she said, some make quite a fuss, others can bear it ….FFS 😫 the nurse came out after to check on me as I’d sobbed quietly throughout. It’s downright medieval really. My 85 year old Mum had a labial biopsy and still refers to it as her FGM procedure. Not to take away from, nor trivialise anyone affected by FGM but mutilation without anaesthesia is mutilation without anaesthesia 🤬
That's awful. I'm a pretty petite (4'11") and went through early menopause and every single time I go to the OB/GYN I have to tell them that I need a smaller speculum. Most just ignore my request. Finally, last year, a new nurse practitioner actually had one when I came in and it made all the difference.
And it has been going on for decades. And it has cost women's lives by, for example, applying research done on men straight to women.
theguardian.com/science/201... They test the drugs on male mice because females experience hormonal fluctuations (menses related) and then women are given drugs that are made for men. It's ridiculous.
It’s the weirdest set up - ever. I do not forget about the men suffering thyroid issues; it might be even worse for them since it’s so prevalent in women, it’s thought of as a woman’s disease. Men too are probably suffering from the misogyny directed at women in this case. Why are so many male doctors attracted to gynaecology? I shudder to think. Too irksome for enough research into women’s health because of hormone issues? In this day and age it beggars belief.
I can honestly say I have been to some pretty horrible female doctors. Perfect example, in 2012, I went to a new ob/gyn. I told her I had been through early menopause. I hadn’t had a period in 10 yrs. A few weeks later, I got a bill from her office for a pregnancy test. She never asked me if she could run that test, she just ran it without my permission. I called her office and told them what I thought of their running tests without my permission, especially a freaking pregnancy test, and that I would not be paying for a test I did not authorize.
In 2017, different female doctor, I told her that I was experiencing a strange burning sensation in the middle of my back, my thoracic spine. She ordered x-rays and nothing showed up so she was supposed to order an MRI of my thoracic spine. She prescribed steroids for me to take over about 7-10 days, which, like a fool, I took because she was the doctor. I had the MRI and guess what that woman only ordered an MRI of my lumbar spine. I wasn’t having any issues in my lower back. Here’s the real kicker, 2 yrs later I got diagnosed w/ osteoporosis. On my 1st DEXA in July 2019, my lumbar spine T-score was a -3.9. Bone loss shows up on MRIs. There is NO WAY that didn’t show up in 2017 and there is NO WAY I lost all that bone between 2017 and 2019.
Additionally, none of the female doctors that I saw between the time that I went through menopause and 2019, ever said to me you need a DEXA scan.
Currently, my best doctor (person who is thorough and smart and awesome at his job) is my gastroenterologist and he is male. I had my last colonoscopy in 2021, I was 53 at the time. His office’s rule is that all women under the age of 55 must take a pregnancy test prior to being given anesthesia. I was lying on the table being prepped when a nurse asked my age, and they she asked if I’d had a pregnancy test. I told her I’d been through menopause—normally they don’t accept this and make you test anyway, but my awesome male gastroenterologist knows he can trust me and didn’t make me get tested.
I have heard about this pregnancy testing in your circumstances before. That is, I know for sure it happens. It’s the insensitivity of it all. I am finding insensitivity everywhere in medical matters, on this thyroid journey. Honestly, I know when I see my GP from my last visit she has no idea who I am and no idea what I have been through; most of it due to half arsed decisions made by not listening and not reading my rather extended file. You would think that someone could have the wit (or computer software) that could produce a succinct summary of the patient’s details before being sat in front of said patient. Something written with some sort of sensitivity towards the patients views on the matter. If there is such a summary, either it’s no good or it’s not read, or there is no compassion. A little compassion would go a long way but I definitely no longer expect it. There will be pockets where there is excellent treatment and handling of patients - just not enough. I feel very sad about this lack of humanity in medicine. It’s chaotic and unsafe for the staff as well as the patients.
Hi Tistapple 🤗
Even without the financial aspects the biases are prevalent throughout medicine. I always say if men had their testicles checked the same way women have their breasts checked (mammogram - testiculargram?) the methods would have been supplanted by something far less painful decades ago……
Positive outcome from increasing the proportion of T3 in my replacement dose.....
Survey of women’s health in the North East and North Cumbria - a chance to share experience of thyroid health care
B12 Injections and Recovery of Health
Proportion of serum thyroid hormone concentrations within the reference ranges in athyreotic patients on levothyroxine monotherapy
Interesting research article on testing visitors to a Thyroid Health Fair in Michigan for hypothyroidism
