\n
Years later, in remission and having migrated to Australia, staff at a Melbourne hospital failed to diagnose a cartilage tear in her hip socket and a slipped disk in her back.<\/p>\n
Instead, they suggested the crippling pain could be linked to \u201cdepression\u201d or being \u201covertired\u201d. It led to Ms Akbar paying for two costly MRI scans out of pocket to be taken seriously.<\/p>\n
\u201c\u2018Oh, it\u2019s nothing.\u2019 I\u2019ve heard that statement so many times… It\u2019s really disheartening as a human being to keep hearing that,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt takes a lot of energy for you to keep advocating for yourself, and that\u2019s the part that\u2019s worrying – a lot of people just stop.\u201d<\/p>\n
Laura – who asked to have her name changed – is close to that point, after years of having symtoms of what would eventually be confirmed as a traumatic brain injury dismissed.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t get healthcare without my partner with me, that\u2019s a blanket rule,\u201d she says, explaining that she feels her concerns are taken \u201cmore seriously\u201d when voiced by a man.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just don’t feel safe, engaging with the system, because when you’re young and you’re told over and over that something is all in your head, it’s easy to believe it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Like so many others across the country, both women say they\u2019re coming forward to share their experiences to seize on this moment of promised change.<\/p>\n
Assistant health minister Ged Kearney – who chairs the national council tasked with examining these issues – says that their stories, along with those of countless others facing additional disadvantage in First Nations, LGBTQ+, and migrant communities will guide its work.<\/p>\n
Her team’s remit is vast and broad areas of focus have already emerged. <\/p>\n
But untangling gender inequity in medicine is no small task, and Australia\u2019s attempts could have far-reaching implications as other nations eye reforms. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n
Ged Kearney<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\nAssistant health minister Ged Kearney with her daughter and granddaughter <\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n
‘A one-size-fits-all approach’<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n\n
The problem is not that \u201call healthcare professionals have some set agenda against women\u201d, Ms Kearny says. <\/p>\n
Rather it’s that bias is woven into the fabric of modern medicine because for centuries it was \u201cdelivered by and designed for\u201d men.<\/p>\n
Women\u2019s health – by contrast \u2013 was often rooted in myth and pernicious gender stereotypes.<\/p>\n
\u201cHysteria\u201d, a now-defunct medical term, was a catch-all diagnosis for females presenting with an array of symptoms, meaning their pain was attributed to emotional causes, rather than biological ones.<\/p>\n
But today, some women say they continue to feel gaslit – disbelieved and patronised – in medical settings. <\/p>\n
And a lack of diversity in medical research compounds the issue.<\/p>\n
More than 70% of participants in early-stage clinical trials globally are still white men, while male cells and animals are used as standard in the lab, according to Professor Robyn Norton, a public health expert.<\/p>\n
The results are then applied to women, intersex, trans and gender-diverse people, causing issues when it comes to their treatment, diagnosis and how their symptoms are understood, Prof Norton says.<\/p>\n
She describes it as a \u201cone-size-fits-all, male-centric\u201d approach to healthcare that has created huge knowledge gaps.<\/p>\n
One analysis carried out in 2019 by the Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Protein Research – which used data from the entire Danish population – found that, across 770 diseases they studied, women were diagnosed later than men, with an average lag time of four years.<\/p>\n
In Australia, research from the University of Sydney in 2018 found that females admitted to hospital for serious heart attack were half as likely as men to get proper treatment and that they died at twice the rate six months after discharge.<\/p>\n
Scientists have warned that another roadblock is the chronic underinvestment in women-specific health issues.<\/p>\n
Endometriosis is pointed to as a key example. Despite impacting roughly 10% of reproductive-age women and girls globally, there is no cure, and it takes seven years on average for patients to be diagnosed.<\/p>\n
One recent study found that 89% of Australian women were still being advised by health professionals that pregnancy would fix their symptoms – despite growing evidence it’s a medical fallacy.<\/p>\n
Such disparities are being recognised and investigated globally, experts say – with countries comparing notes on what might be the best approach. <\/p>\n
The UK, for one, recently announced measures aimed at closing the \u201cgender health gap\u201d in its system. And in the US, the federal government has launched an initiative to improve funding and research into women\u2019s health, led by First Lady Jill Biden.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n
Bonney Corbin\/Australian Women’s Health Alliance<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\nBonney Corbin has spent her career trying to make Australian healthcare more equitable<\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n\n
Ms Kearny says Australia is already making inroads. <\/p>\n
In the past 12 months, her government has opened 22 endometriosis and pelvic pain clinics aimed at improving care and diagnosis. <\/p>\n
The nation’s drug regulator has removed restrictions on prescribing and dispensing medical abortion pills to increase universal access to reproductive healthcare.<\/p>\n
And researchers will soon be able to examine how key diseases are experienced in female, intersex and gender diverse populations at a new centre Prof Norton is leading.<\/p>\n
She\u2019s optimistic her team\u2019s work could \u201ccatalyse the kind of change in Australia that could see it become a leader in this space\u201d.<\/p>\n
There\u2019s also been some investment in women\u2019s health in the latest national budget. Almost A$100m ($66m; \u00a352m) has been set aside for things like reducing the out-of-pocket costs associated with gynaecological conditions, as well as studies into menopause, pregnancy loss and fertility. All are issues which have been historically under-funded.<\/p>\n
But while advocates like Bonney Corbin \u2013 the chair of Australia\u2019s Women\u2019s Health Alliance who also sits on the council – have welcomed the cash injection, they say it doesn\u2019t go far enough and that state governments should step up too.<\/p>\n
\u201cA gender lens on healthcare is more than funding things related to breasts and uteruses. We need to look at women\u2019s bodies on the whole,\u201d she explains.<\/p>\n
In the coming months, Ms Kearney’s advisory body will release its first set of major reform recommendations.<\/p>\n
She says it has no intention of putting forward \u201ctick-box\u201d measures that tinker around the edges.<\/p>\n
Instead, she says the long-term goal is to create a blueprint to \u201cbuild a healthcare system that actually works for everyone\u201d.<\/p>\n
Whether the advice will lead to lasting change remains an open question despite the assistant health minister\u2019s participation at this point, Ms Corbin says.<\/p>\n
If it doesn\u2019t though, she hints that there could be public backlash.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve mobilised a whole lot of women in this process \u2013 now we need action.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"16 hours ago By\u00a0Hannah Ritchie,\u00a0BBC News, Sydney Heidi Metcalf A recent government survey found that two thirds of women, like Heidi Metcalf, have encountered gender bias or discrimination in Australian healthcare There\u2019s a memory, or more specifically a moment, that came to define Heidi Metcalf\u2019s second birth. It wasn\u2019t saying goodbye to her husband and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":37797,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[41],"tags":[7556,1996,6187,848],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37796"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37796"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37796\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":37798,"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37796\/revisions\/37798"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/37797"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37796"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37796"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kede.com.br\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37796"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}