WMC FBomb

Too many doctors still don’t believe their female patients

Wmc News Doctor Unsplash Rawpixel 22619

When I was 14, I rapidly gained a lot of weight for seemingly no reason. I didn’t know it at the time, but this was the first symptom I had of Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome — or PCOS.

PCOS is a chronic hormonal disorder that affects 1 in 10 women of childbearing age. In addition to weight gain, I experienced symptoms, including light-headedness from low blood sugar, irregular periods, painful acne, hair loss, and excess facial hair growth. Other symptoms can include insulin resistance, ovarian cysts, and anxiety and depression, while medical complications include prediabetes/diabetes, abnormal cholesterol and triglyceride levels, heart disease, stroke, infertility, endometrial and ovarian cancers, obesity and sleep apnoea.

I tried getting help numerous times, especially since my symptoms got worse over time. But none of the doctors I saw took me seriously. Time and time again, the doctors fat-shamed me rather than giving me a diagnosis. They told me to “stop eating pizzas and burgers” and to exercise. They didn’t believe me when I told them I ate a healthy diet and went to a school with a militant, mandatory physical exercise program. 

Luckily, through the power of the internet, I learned about PCOS. I went to the hospital and requested the hormone tests and an ultrasound. I had numerous cysts in my ovaries, and my hormones were outside the normal parameters. Based on the lab results and the physical symptoms, the GP sent me to a gynecologist.

At that moment, I felt elated. Vindicated. After years of being dismissed, I had a diagnosis and could finally start treatment. 

Unfortunately, the worst was yet to come. 

When I saw the gynecologist, she told me that the only way to “cure” my PCOS was to cut out most foods from my diet and to count calories obsessively. When I told her that I make a point to eat fruit with every meal, she told me that “fruit makes you fat.” If I got hungry, she advised, I could drink up to 2 liters of green tea per day. She also told me to go to the gym daily without explaining how I’d have the energy to work out when I was barely eating.

Going into that doctor’s appointment, I knew my dietary habits weren’t perfect and was aware that, when discussing my weight loss, the doctor would likely talk about food. But I expected constructive, medically-informed advice, not “How to Develop an Eating Disorder 101.”

I am not the only PCOS patient who has been put in danger of developing an eating disorder. PCOS patients are often asked to diet, and dieting is a risk factor of developing eating disordersThe Centre for Eating Disorders at Sheppard Pratt states that “dieting is the most common precipitating factor in the development of an eating disorder.” Though there is a serious lack of data about eating disorders from low and middle-income countries, it is estimated that eating disorders affect 70 million people worldwide, most of whom are female.

It makes sense, therefore, that women with PCOS are at increased odds of having abnormal eating disorder scores and specific eating disorder diagnoses, according to a systematic review and meta-analysis of studies on PCOS and eating disorders. A community-based cohort study published in August reported that women with PCOS reported a higher prevalence of eating disorders, low self-esteem, and psychological distress.  This supports a 2017 study that found that women with PCOS had over four times the rate of disordered eating than women without PCOS, and the PCOS cohort studied had a high prevalence of bulimia nervosa, binge eating disorder, and night eating syndrome.

Clearly not all healthcare providers have absorbed this widely available information. Almost all of the several gynecologists I’ve seen, and even other doctors who have seen “PCOS” listed in my medical file, have advised me to diet – and none have ever screened me for abnormal eating behaviours. 

Like many other health issues that primarily or solely affect women, PCOS is not only underdiagnosed, underserved, and underfunded, but widely misunderstood even by the doctors supposedly trained to treat them. Even though I eventually got the help I needed, I got lucky; and luck isn’t something people should have to rely on to get the healthcare they need.



More articles by Category: Disability, Health, WMC Loreen Arbus Journalism Program
More articles by Tag: Discrimination, Equality, Sexism
SHARE

[SHARE]

Article.DirectLink

Contributor
Yvonne Wabai
Categories
Sign up for our Newsletter

Learn more about topics like these by signing up for Women’s Media Center’s newsletter.