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sandrareilly513's review against another edition
5.0
Maya Dusenbery has pulled back the curtain and opened readers' eyes to what it's like to be a woman with an illness. Often ignored, labeled "hysterical" or a hypochondriac, and told we're not as sick as we think we are, many women walk into their doctors' offices with the odds stacked against them. Dusenbery explains the issues women face each time they go to see a medical professional, arguing her case with compelling evidence including statistics like women being 5 times more likely to be sent home from the ER in the midst of a heart attack due to the misconception that heart disease is a "men's" issue despite the fact that it kills more women each year than cancer.
I found myself in the pages of Doing Harm, particularly the section on chronic fatigue and how people think it just means you're tired when, in reality, those who suffer from CFS are "functionally exhausted" and that the majority of people with CFS are likely to go misdiagnosed because doctors aren't comfortable diagnosing (and some don't "believe in") chronic fatigue syndrome. It felt so reassuring to know there are other people who understand, but it also felt a bit overwhelming to think that sexism is never going to leave medicine. I have been blessed with a wonderful endocrinologist who takes each of my concerns very seriously, but she was the third I consulted before finding someone who would listen. The fact that most medical educational institutions only teach one or a few courses on women's health, which many consider to be solely reproductive health, leaves me defeated. We expect our doctors to know how to help us and what is best for us, and it is depressing to think that some are not as open-minded, accepting, and willing to help as we'd hope they would be.
I found myself in the pages of Doing Harm, particularly the section on chronic fatigue and how people think it just means you're tired when, in reality, those who suffer from CFS are "functionally exhausted" and that the majority of people with CFS are likely to go misdiagnosed because doctors aren't comfortable diagnosing (and some don't "believe in") chronic fatigue syndrome. It felt so reassuring to know there are other people who understand, but it also felt a bit overwhelming to think that sexism is never going to leave medicine. I have been blessed with a wonderful endocrinologist who takes each of my concerns very seriously, but she was the third I consulted before finding someone who would listen. The fact that most medical educational institutions only teach one or a few courses on women's health, which many consider to be solely reproductive health, leaves me defeated. We expect our doctors to know how to help us and what is best for us, and it is depressing to think that some are not as open-minded, accepting, and willing to help as we'd hope they would be.
clarkf87's review against another edition
emotional
informative
reflective
medium-paced
5.0
This book is an infuriating but important read on how the medical field gaslights women into believing their health issues do not exist and projects its own patriarchal views to keep women sicker for longer than men. How many times have we been told to go home, suck up your pain, take the anxiety/depression medications, drink a glass of wine to relax, and/or please your partner because it will do both your bodies good?
Through research and testimonials, this book explains how little women’s health issues have been studied in the past and how many of the ailments were classified to be “hysteria.” For decades, scientists even used only male animals for their medical research. Health issues like heart attacks and multiple sclerosis are still misdiagnosed in women today.
Women are NOT hysterical, hypochondriacs. We are untapped resources of information for women’s health. Our symptoms are real and our health matters. Women have been left behind in medical science and untrusted with our own bodies for too long.
PS I’m never calling myself a hypochondriac again. My symptoms are and were always REAL!
szaibol's review against another edition
4.0
Very informative but very dense.
There are a lot of stories from different women about how they were (not) treated by health professionals and their pain was brushed off, belittled or just simply attributed to female hysteria.
The book is about the American health care, and health care professionals but unfortunately this negligence and lazy science is often the case in other countries as well. As a middle aged woman who grew up in Eastern Europe I have had good and bad experiences with the Healthcare system and especially with gynecologicists. In the US though I haven't gotten any remarks during any of my visits.
But even though I may not have had negative experiences so far that doesn't mean that it won't happen in the future - to me, or to my family.
There are a lot of stories from different women about how they were (not) treated by health professionals and their pain was brushed off, belittled or just simply attributed to female hysteria.
The book is about the American health care, and health care professionals but unfortunately this negligence and lazy science is often the case in other countries as well. As a middle aged woman who grew up in Eastern Europe I have had good and bad experiences with the Healthcare system and especially with gynecologicists. In the US though I haven't gotten any remarks during any of my visits.
But even though I may not have had negative experiences so far that doesn't mean that it won't happen in the future - to me, or to my family.
lifesarosch's review against another edition
3.5
Interesting until the promotion of chronic Lyme as non quackery.