Doctor Reacts to John Oliver | Last Week Tonight: Bias in Medicine
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- Опубліковано 20 жов 2024
- John Oliver discussed medical bias on his latest episode and you requested that I react to it. This episode is slightly different than most of my other reaction videos as I gave a watch before doing the reaction video in order to vet the research discussed on the program. If you'd like for me to cover this topic in more detail please do comment below.
Original Video: • Bias In Medicine: Last...
Diversity Video: • Is This Doctor Racist?...
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Doctor Mike Varshavski
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A med student asked his professor, "What if my beliefs make me uncomfortable treating someone who's transgender or gay?" The professor replied, "Find a different career." We need professors like this.
I already adore that professor. That's a glorious comeback.
Good!
Yep. That’s exactly how a psychology grad student said it in one of my friend’s classes.
And then the trans or gay says can i get a different doc
What type of doctor would refuse to want to give medical help to a patient? Don't they take an oath that they have to help anyone?
Both I and my wife have had our gallbladders removed. My wife was sent home TWICE for a ‘stomach ache’, whereas I was kept overnight and checked. This was at the same ER at the same hospital.
To be fair, women complain a lot.
@@theremix54 😑
@@theremix54 To be fair, thats a stupid generalization, and it sounds like you are complaining instead.
@@theremix54 you are exactly what's wrong in this world. Disgusting.
@@AuroraDAmico how is he wrong
As a girl with a medical condition I will offer this piece of advise to any young woman who wants to take it!! If you ever go in for something that is abnormal and the doctor refuses to run any tests and tries to send you home make them write it in your medical chart! This way if you go to another specialist they can see that no tests were run and that dr looks like an absolute fool. This has worked for me every time. when I tell the drs to write that they refused to treat me/test me in my chart they 'all of a sudden' think that this may be something to look into.
Thanks for the advice!
That’s very good advice! Good advice for everyone, really. 🙂👍
Heck I'm not even a girl and sharing this sounds like a great decision on your part!
This absolutely works. My sister once went into the ER because she was in excruciating pain and they tried to send her home without ever letting her see a doctor. My mom told them she wanted a note - signed by a doctor - saying she came into the ER on this date, her symptoms were X, Y, and Z, and that their diagnosis was "It's nothing, go home." Within 10 minutes, the head of the Nephrology department at the hospital was in my sister's room telling her that she was in kidney failure (due to an infection) and starting her on IV antibiotics.
I wish I knew this back when I was hospitalized for complications from an undiagnosed genetic condition. It was like pulling teeth to get someone to do a CT scan. I walked around for nearly 2 MONTHS coughing up blood before I got scanned.
I'm a maternal mortality statistic (revived, fortunately). The nurse in recovery ignored my anxiety over something feeling wrong and being scared. Told me I was fine and got me extra blankets because I was 'just cold'. The extra blankets covered up that I was post-partum hemorrhaging from a clotting issue (Which I couldn't feel from my epidural post C-section) and I quietly bled out until I lost consciousness and my heart stopped. I think some medical professionals dismiss 'panicky new moms' as being worried about trivial things because they can be, but they shouldn't. It's unfortunate that doctors and medical professionals are trained to practice and treat patients based on pattern recognition when bias is developed the same way.
Glad you survived.
I used to teach first aid to new mums, I always stressed to them that the best symptom there was a problem with their baby was their gut. If they knew something was wrong, even if they couldn't identify any actual symptoms, seek medical aid & if ignored, seek medical aid from someone else & someone else until listened to, cause it might just save their mothers life. Yes, new mums are paniky, but they also tend to know in their gut if something is seriously wrong with their baby, same as we all know in our gut if something is seriously wrong with our own bodies, like you did in your situation there. Doctors & other medical staff should always listen to it! If it turns out it's nothing, then they've built a repore with their patient in the process & it will help both parties in the future
My mom could have died the same way after her second kid. It was a female nurse who dismissed and gaslit her while she was hemorrhaging and too weak to lift her head - she said "when I had MY kid, I stood up and WALKED to my recovery room". Turned out my mom had blood loss that would warrant an emergency transfusion. I'd like to think that nurse learned something from it, but I don't have much hope for someone with that little compassion and concern.
We learned " always look under the blanket"!!!!
Considering how many things can go wrong in pregnancy, I am always surprised how women’s intuition if something being wrong is easily dismissed.
I am glad you have survived and am sorry about what you went through.
Congrats for surviving and sorry you had to go through this.
I took my son to the Doctor several times ..got the usual eye roll (over protective Mother )
Made my Husband come to the next day ... Doctor listened to him ordered a blood test. .Next day he was in hospital diagnosed with AML
( Leukaemia )
that's horrible, your child is doing okay
mothers are over protective though, doc's fault regardless but you cannot deny that mothers are a lot more protective of their child than fathers
@@keyz4769 Mothers are also usually the person most responsible for care of the kids, so they would notice any differences in health or behavior in the kids much more quickly than the father.
Probably your husband was more assertive than you were.
Time to find a new doctor.
My favorite comeback for "it's all in your head" is "so are brain cancer and strokes."
And Concussions.
I work in mental health - when I do encounter people who say "isn't it just all in their head?", my usual comeback is "well, it's not in their freaking spleen, is it?" :D
Ouch, i've heard that too many times
if youre working class it's all in your head. If daddy has 7 figures in the bank its a medical emergency
"Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?"
I was actually labeled a drug seeker when I went through 12 years of my life (from 15 to 27 years old) to get treatment and even a doctor to take my abdominal/pelvic pain seriously and diagnose my endometriosis. I stopped bothering to go bc I was treated so horribly. I'd even a cyst rupture and was shood away. When an amazing dr finally operated on me, the first thing he said to me upon waking from surgery was an apology that no one had ever listened or treated me bc I had it everywhere on almost every organ and was of the worst cases he'd seen. Finally getting that validation that I wasn't crazy, it wasn't in my head, nor was it normal to feel as much pain as I did and still do on an almost daily basis was so amazing, despite the confirmation of a chronic pain condition.
OMG. They nailed horseshoes onto your feet? The horror!
And then he said that your insurance didn't cover it and that you had to file for medical bankruptcy?
It's not that I don't believe you, I just like dark humor.
I relate so hard. Young age doesn't help either. I should be dead from neglect but somehow made it. I need help for pain too. Sometimes it makes me wish I wasn't afraid of death. I wish you well. 💙🙏
Lisa Hennessy I understand completely. I ended up with cancer because of endometriosis. Mine as well was on every organ. I was also labeled like you so I feel your pain.
gaming_granny_ 19 I’m so sorry you weren’t given the care you do obviously needed. I hope you’re doing better now.
I respect Dr. Mike a great deal, and I love that he’s taking a resolution approach vs a problematic approach. However, on the issue of race it’s not just because black people tend to have access to lesser quality hospitals that they have less access to opioids and are treated poorly. When my sister was sick I witnessed doctors gaslight her and make light of her symptoms. My mother got upset and spoke up for her, I’m glad that the lead doctor that came in to resolve the issues my sister was having. Dr. Mike is right that we can’t only look at this as a race issue, but there are doctors out there that do have racial bias. Dr. Mike did an amazing excellent job breaking this segment down.
Serena Williams almost died in childbirth due to discrimination. :(
Just seconds after at 25:40 J. Oliver explains disparities exist even when you control for socioeconomic factors, Dr. Mike at 25:58 insists that [bias] is not the only thing that's happening. It is not, but it is certainly happening!
I only go to younger doctors because I have had a history of older doctors disregarding my very real pain. I can say that the younger generation of doctors have been amazing at listening to me and actually treating me. Seems to be a difference between the schooling.
Younger doctors also tend to be more proactive in keeping up with changes in the field and things relating to their field. We have a younger pediatrician, and within the span of 2.5 years he changed recommendations concerning when to start solids, which solids to start with, and when to turn car seats forward. We lived in a different state for a while and our much older pediatrician there criticized me for not feeding my baby rice cereal and still having my petite, barely 2 year old facing backwards in the car. I've also personally experienced a drastic difference in care between a family doctor about my age vs a family doctor a good 30 years my senior (and I'm not in my teens or 20s).
I had the same with old white male doctors. My current PCP, who I really like only graduated in 2001 at age 48. I trust her with my life.
It might also be that the younger doctors come from a generation that is more accepting of what we are telling them.
Yeah, I think the older ones are creepy as well. I mean, I had a male doctor for a while as a kid. And he wanted to check when my period might be coming, so he puts his hands on my lower torso area. And honestly, I was hella uncomfortable with that, because I knew when my period was coming and did not need him to tell me.
@@jellypeaches26 oh my goodness...what did you do? Did you tell your parents at least? 😧
I went through three years of misdiagnosis from doctors. I went from being a competitive 18 year old female triathlete to being completely bedridden from mindnumbingly painful joints, tendons and nerves that paralysed me. One doctor thought I was making it up, another told me it would go away and I should "relax and have a margarita", an ER nurse told me I was "hysterical" because nobody was taking my pain seriously (after three years), and yet another one used used the fact I was completely vulnerable an paralysed to grope me.
A fantastic young doctor finally diagnosed me with Ankylosing Spondylitis, a chronic auto-immune disease and form of arthritis. My mother who has the same disease has had a similar experience.
No question in my opinion, there are serious issues with women being diagnosed and not being believed. Not just in the USA though.
The world we live in! :-(
I hope you make a full recovery!
We need a medical board review of every doctor and every case they encounter. If another doctor finds the actual cause and the original doctors acted in neglect, there should be an immediate review of the case.
@@darkriku12 won’t work - drs have a code to protect each other
I wish we could sue this doctors, but unfortunately it’s very rare to win such cases :/
You are right , my 25 year old daughter has Mysenthia Gravis MuSK she was sent home from the hospital again and again until we got a referral from my GP , she was referred immediately to a neurologist, her eyes were half closed her speech was so slurred , she couldn’t hold get head up and couldn’t eat without food going into her lungs , she was sent from the neurologist straight to the emergency room , within minutes she stopped breathing and was on life support where she began the fight of her life , thankfully today she is better and has been through hell to get there . She also has constant treatement and will for the rest of her life . The doctor who kept sending her away from that hospital and making out she was just hysterical etc came to apologise , her father told him to leave and I don’t blame him as blind Freddy could have seen something was so seriously wrong and she was truly lucky she didn’t die
After I was diagnosised with my heart condition, I had one student resident in the teaching hospital who went around and told every doctor that it was my anxiety.
They did a pet scan to prove me wrong and it came back that I had viral cardiomyopathy and stage 3 CHF.
I had never felt so poorly treated in all my life. I was only 18.
Now, I'm 23 and with a new group of Doctors whom listen and take what I saw into consideration. Such an amazing turn around.
I rarely respond to these but I gotta admit I do respect and like dr mikes outlook and opinion on things, wether I agree or disagree with them. Right after I watched the John Oliver piece I thought about dr mikes reaction and what it would be. I actually haven’t watched his reaction yet but am getting ready to but I expect him to fall somewhere in the middle meaning he has to admit this stuff happens, which is shameful, but to think it’s rampant might be a bit much. But as always I am a white male so I always have to admit that is the perspective I’m coming from and don’t have to experience or live the other side which is why it’s so important to hear as much as we can from as many point of views as we can to understand, relate and best figure anything out.
As terrible as that is and i do feel sorry for you. it doesn't have to be sexism, he could be either wrong because he is dismissive of verbally addressed symptoms or because he doesn't believe teens or women. doesn't have to be sexism. that being said i hope he learned his lesson and is a more considerate in the future.
I think the doctors may have mis diagnosed you to have stress induced cardiomyopathy (takotsubo cardiomyopathy) as you were young and it is one of the commonest cause in young people nowadays.
I have a heart condition and vasculitis, I'm the same age as you and my symptoms presented around 16 yrs old. I was just diagnosed last month. I think young women especially are not believed, we're seen as sensitive little girls who overreact. In reality our pain is often more severe then men's but we handle it better. So hard to find doctors who listen and believe us. Hope you are doing well now.
I am kinda curious as to where you find the statistic that women handle pain better. i always thought it was the other way around, also i am curious how they managed to test this. would love to be educated on this.
This “women presenting atypically” thing exposes the root of the problem: “typical” is based on symptoms and disease courses in men, and instruction is based on that. This is where the bias begins and only a radical overhaul of how we view, classify and describe conditions and treatment will change that. Awareness training can overcome some of the ill effects of this bias, but the bias should be eradicated. It’s not just male providers who are tainted with this patriarchal construction - female providers suffer from it, also. I’ve changed doctors more than once because of it, and I was right about my health issue every time.
That is it. This is a great point that I would love for Dr. Mike to see after that discussion. The deeper intersection of two issues he discussed that contribute to medical bias.
When greater than 50% of the population displays the same symptoms we can no longer call them 'atypical'. Dr. Mike fell into this same verbiage error.
I think what "typical" is really based on is the population that was examined in the related studies. If historically these studies did not control for sex that's a pretty serious issue that needs to improved on. Same for controlling over more population segments like race and/or gene data as much as that is available. Awareness training for personal bias is irrelevant imho. Awareness training to the incompleteness of many of these studies does sound relevant.
Agreed. How can it be "atypical" if HALF of patients present with these symptoms?!
Atypically in this context means not regularly. So you tend to see large differences in the symptoms amongst women
I got told by many GP's that my painful periods were 'normal' and I was over reacting and as a result couldnt get a referral to a specialist for YEARS. After I finally got a referral, it had gotten so bad I needed immediate surgery to remove the lesions which had stuck together my internal organs. Doctors need to take painful periods more seriously.
That's bad. I went to my gyn and had a routine scan. I had been having serious cramps. Some doctors ignore what endometriosis cramps are like. Folded in half, can't walk to the bathroom pain. In my case it was caught in the beginning. In Brazil you can just go to the specialist of your choice, as long as your plan covers it. ob-gyn for routine check ups is pretty much a given.
I wish I could like this more than once
Me too years of period problems years of making no in roads.
Finally an ovarian cyst ruptured which was sadly attached to the ovarian artery which also ruptured. An emergency hysterectomy and oophrectomy , 6 days in intensive care , weeks of recovery all of which could have been avoided if just once someone had listened to me.
+
It took years for me to get diagnosed with Endometriosis and 6 different doctors to finally get one who listened to me about my pain. I was 30 when I was finally diagnosed and I have been having horribly painful periods since I was 16. I was just ever told "most women experience painful periods"... Most women don't want to die when they're on their periods... Even when sex became unbearable because of the endometriosis, I had one doctor tell me it was all in my head. That I just needed "warmed up more" before intercourse.
I got so teary watching this.
I'm a professional registered nurse and as a black woman, I've experienced sheer neglect when in pain. I've experienced delay in receiving pain meds saying I'm hysterical in a gynae ward. I had to convince the nurses that I need help. I worsened and only got taken seriously when I collapsed.
I'm a retired RN, BSN & a white female. I hate to tell you how many times I had to tell doctors- humor me, do tests, perform surgery, etc. When all was said & done the doctors were completely astonished by what they had found (which they wouldn't have found, had I not pushed). Doctors Absolutely Hate Me!
And, I was just as tenacious an advocate for my patients (starting in Nursing School).
@@dee_dee_place we thank you for your tenacity. That's truly patient advocacy at it's best.
Some doctors are too arrogant to realise that they can gain a lot from listening more especially to RNs
@@dee_dee_place I once ordered a portable CXR and got a chest tube and tray to the floor for a patient who had a lung filled with fluid from an improperly placed central line. I knew what was going on, but the resident refused to listen to me, see the patient or order a CXR, so I "verbal ordered" it myself because by the time my shift started, the patient was almost dead. I suspect that if the patient and I were both males, he would have listened. My actions saved her life, but put my license in jeopardy. That happened about 30 years ago, but to this day, I still remember the fluid from her lung flooding the floor the second the incision was made in her chest wall. I'd be willing to bet there are thousands of stories of nurses advocating for and/or saving the lives of female and minority patients whose doctors are failing them.
I personally can't get prescription pain medications. I am a recovering drug addict and once doctors hear that it is like they shut their ears to anythimg else you say regarding pain medications, it doesn't matter that I have been clean from all drugs since August 18, 2000 and would refuse refills or anything too strong. But when you have a surgery you need something at least for a few days and I can't even get that if I am being sent home after the surgery because it is not being controlled by medical staff.
@@crystalmcmurray9181 Maybe you shouldn't tell them about the substance abuse history.
This hit home for me.
Story time: I’ve been excessively tired. I went to the doctor about it six months ago. I was asked to fill out a sleep schedule documenting how much sleep I got, and how often.
When I returned to the doctor I had to bring my four young children since my sitter cancelled at the last moment. He took a brief glance at my chart and then at my swarm of kids and told me I’d probably just sleep better when my kids were grown and gone.
Flash forward, this week I went in again asked for a different doctor, gave her the same info- she checked my thyroid. Ordered an ultrasound, scheduled me an appointment with an ENT and sure enough I have SIX nodules that have been suppressing my esophagus creating sleep apnea and making it difficult for me to get REM sleep.
My only regret was choosing to feel defeated by that first doctor and not getting help for another six months.
I KNEW something was wrong- fight for your medical care, because not all doctors are as mindful as Dr.Mike.
NaTasha Norris I may actually request an ultrasound as I feel I may have the same issue. I only ever thought nodules affected your vocal chords. Never did I imagine they could be the culprit for my sleep apnea. Thank you for this post ❤️ hopefully, you are now able to sleep better!
Many studies show female Drs on average are just better at being doctors. Lol Women kill it!
StarkRaving Ralph cause women in general care more, it’s that motherly instinct
@@THEMOCU I won't disagree, although men have an instinct for raising children, too, so I wouldn't call it the only reason. Women are generally better at multitasking, listening and paying attention to the big picture.
@@starkravingralph Women kill it by not killing it (the patient) XD
Yeah, as a guy with chronic illness, I've found that of all the doctors I've seen, women have been the most thorough and have listened to me the best. It's not surprising at all that they make better doctors.
I understand Dr Mike's inclination to highlight the progress made, but when he says it's not John's job to highlight progress, he is 100% right!
The intention of John Oliver's piece is NOT to say, 'Hey, look how far we've come!' because the point is that we haven't come far enough. Yes it's important to acknowledge those who are working to create positive change, but we can't rest our focus on what we have already done if we truly want to motivate further progress... idk, that's just my two cents. Decent video over all. Lost me a bit at the end with a few too many excuses.
But John Oliver is straight spreading misinformation. I get that his point is to say that things are messed up, but he is overinflating facts.
@@dylanwhitmer5325 I agree with what you said. But inflating/overstating a problem is only harmful if people over-correct for the problem. When’s the last time that our society OVER-corrected for a problem? It’s probably happened before, but I believe it’s a lot more common for society to create half-solutions and then treat them like full ones. This is also not a good thing, because it can lead people to thinking that an issue is solved, and then HEAVILY resist any further action because it feels or seems unnecessary. Progress is important to talk about, but focusing on progress made can imply that a problem is solved, when it may only be less severe.
It’s not like the correct answer is to focus on problems, either, because the world will never run out of problems that need solving. Additionally, I am SO biased on this specific issue because I love watching Last Week Tonight. But I still felt like throwing in my two cents.
Either way, have a good day, stranger✌️
I feel the same exact way. This comment articulated my feelings well.
exactly!!
I understand where Dr. Mike is coming from and 100 percent agree that all possibilities need to be explored and addressed, but it feels wrong to focus so specifically on, for example, the cities where patients live. That's obviously a factor (inner-city health care, for example, is not as good as health care in suburbs), but so is racism. We still have plenty of racist people in this country who will, consciously or subconsciously, view and treat people differently because of skin color. I'm sure part of the reason black people get opioids less often is that doctors are afraid they'll abuse them because they associate black people with drug use. After watching this video, I feel like neither John Oliver or Dr. Mike is unbiased. And I think that's to be expected to some extent.
I saw a TED talk about how its extremely difficult for women to get a doctor to agree a sterilization. Men can say, "i dont want kids." Boom, they get a vasectomy in minutes. But if a woman says, "i dont want kids." They constantly get denied and told, "you will regret it." From the woman's perspective, they are in pain, dont feel comfortable carrying, and/or need the procedure for other health reasons. Their defense is, "if i want a family, i will foster or adopt from the many many cases of children without families. Why do i HAVE to be blood related to them??" And they still get turned down.
Could be because a vasectomy is pretty reversible but a hysterectomy is very much not. Something to consider before immediately thinking it’s something more nefarious
Correct. A vasectomy is reversible. However, there is also a pretty strong component of women just not being trusted when it comes to their own reproductive health care. Even just telling people you don't want kids, most of them will dismiss you and tell you "you'll change your mind" or " what if your husband wants kids?"
It's ridiculous. So to actually get a tubal ligation? Forget about it. We're forced to be able to have kids in case our husbands want kids.
A vasectomy is a lot less dangerous than a hysterectomy. That’s why.
Toni Lancey Look, I agree that there is bias against women in medicine - I have been on the receiving end of it, myself. However, I disagree with you that doctors are more likely to greenlight vasectomies instead of hysterectomies because of bias. The fact of the matter is that vasectomies and hysterectomies are not the same. Hysterectomies result in a far higher chance of very dangerous complications, and that is why doctors are more hesitant to recommend them than vasectomies. If you’re in a male-female relationship and you decide that one of you has to get one, the man should always be the one to do it, because he will face significantly less risk.
After 8 straight weeks (not uncommon for me) of heavy bleeding and pain that OTC meds were not helping, I went medication free(I can't drive on the types of painkillers I needed to be able to go back and forth to the bathroom) to my male (Texan) obgyn. So picked for being the top rated in my city. I nearly passed out more times than I can count, just waiting to be seen. When they took my BP it was so high he demanded the nurse take it again and call the ER if it's that high the second time. The first time she took it after saying to me "oh the doctor doesn't believe in prescribing painkillers for menstrual pain" so the "OMG he's not going to help me"panic hit right before she read me. It was still high the second time but he wouldn't believe me that it was because of the horrible pain. I explained that this wasn't my first rodeo. I was done. I was finally over 35 (the arbitrary age some doctors say you must wait for), I had never in my life wanted children. My uterus my whole life had been nothing but a source of pain. I wanted it gone. I had tried every birth control, they make me literally insane. Not myself. And they make me hate human contact which is impossible in my marriage. His reply was "first let's get you back on birth control. Then *we'll see* about getting you and appointment *to discuss* the *possibility* of *scheduling* a *screening* for a hysterectomy" that's entitled white man for "I know your body better than you" (you see how many words it takes him to not say "let's make you an appt"). Well I'm a Yankee. So I left his office, went home and googled "hysterectomy in Denver (the closest northern city we were most familiar with)" and called the first doctor who took my insurance and had studied in a large NORTHERN city. After reviewing my records and examining me she said I was a perfect candidate. I had tried every other option. I didn't want kids. I had plans if I changed my mind. She couldn't fathom a doctor seeing my in so much pain (I was STILL bleeding the same cycle a month later when I drive 12 hours to see her) and denying me both painkillers and surgery. I got a script that day. Enough to last till my scheduled surgery. And now, after 1.5 years without a uterus, I can live a full life. I'm not stuck in bed in pain for months at a time. I'm actually starting a business.... Even with Covid! My sex life is back to where it was before birth control snatched it away. And all because a doctor accepted that a black woman knew her body and what she needed. ... But don't get me wrong. She was the 6th (at least) that I had to ask to even be taken seriously.
When I was 8 years old I had extreme abdominal pain, vomiting, and fever for about half a day. My mom doesn't have a health science degree, but she worked as a clinic manager for years, so she had a base knowledge. She guessed it was my appendix. She took me to the hospital at 3 am when I just couldn't take the pain anymore. The male night doctor told her it was just the flu WITHOUT taking any tests. He told my mom she was just being an overprotective mom. Thankfully, my mom is not a pushover and demanded he take some tests. So he did. Yep, it was appendicitis and it was close to rupturing. Thankful for my strong mother, not thankful for the doctor that tried to send me home
Geez. I’m glad you’re okay
I had my appendix removed three years ago. Went to the ER late at night. A young doctor did all kinds of tests like ultra sound, asked all kinds of questions and finally said: I gotta ask a collegue, I'm just not quiet sure. Few minutes later a doctor in his sixties entered the room, pushed his middle finger into my belly and asked me: does that hurt? I could nt answer in a proper way but I guess he took my facial expression as a yes. In Germany, the doctor is obliged to give you all the information necessary to make a qualified decission on how to proceed. The decission is then up to you. He then told me, if I had it removed, Id be home in three days. If i didnt, I would suffer miserably for the next two days until I would eventually die. Easiest decission ever. In this case, experience beat technology.
@@Mistfink1980 yasss I love doctors who aren't afraid to ask colleagues and older doctors, I once had a doctor ask a nurse what she thought which is awesome.
I had a VERY similar experience. I had appendicitis for months and was turned away from the hospital diagnosed with "bad cramps" or "ovarian cysts". My appendix miraculously abscessed itself in its self contained goo and I was able to carry on with my life for a few months, including swimming competitively. When I started to have spiking fevers again, we went back to the hospital and the doctor determined that the mass I had was a tumor. The only reason why they discovered the appendicitis was that they couldn't just take a sample of the "tumor" due to the very delicate area of where it was located in my abdomen. Finally, when I was cut open it was clear that I had appendicitis.
I am very lucky to have survived that. I learned how important it is to keep pushing for second opinions.
god
My mom was told she was being a "big baby" in saying there was painful pressure on her lower abdomen during a routine exam. She had stage four ovarian cancer.
Omg, is she okay now? Did she report those “medical professionals”? I’m so sad she had to deal with that!
My mother ripped the tendons in her leg and the doctor chewed her out for crying and told her that there are women out there worse off than she was.
@@alyxskyler she managed another 4 years which was 3/12 years beyond what they predicted. suffice to say - women being ignored and talked down to in doctor's offices is a real thing and they should not 'just let it go' when they feel like something is wrong. I have first-hand experience of that.
@@EddiePresley I'm glad that she was so strong, that she carried on for so long.
Omg.
Great session. Dr. Mike. When I studied the fresh research a few years ago, about the lower survival rate for women vs. men presenting to hospitals with heart attacks, it struck me that I had to be very precise about my language from now on. Instead of saying: “Women don’t always have typical symptoms,” we should say “Women don’t always have the symptoms that are typical in men.”
Thank you
This is why House is the best. He treats everyone with same loathing scathing hatred :D
troyty007 unfortunately he isn’t real
Wow that’s so true
If he was real, he would have lost his license long before he reach the status he had in the beginning of the series. A lot of what he did would be, at minimum, malpractice even if the patient survived, and much of it was actually criminal. He wasn't sent to prison for no reason.
🤣
@@chocmilkshake24 He's more real than your future
I had multiple asthma attacks and my doctor told me I had anxiety and wanted to skip school. Depending on where you live, you gotta advocate for yourself. Thank you for the great video doctor Mike!!
RDsketches !!!!!!!!!!
my chemistry and biology teacher is a better doctor than my ACTUAL doctor. and my school teaches basically economics, laws, languages. (i’m italian, school system is SO different)
That's what Wanda says at the end of the John Oliver Video
RDsketches been there. Done that. My abdominal pain brushed off as period pain by the school doc… ulcers.
Asthma attacks brushed off as me being “too fat”…
Awful shit.
Oh do I know those diagnosis' so well. As someone with autoimmune diseases that could have been nipped in the bud before they became full blown disabling.
Fake wheezing!!! /S
I'm a female and it took 12 years to get a diagnosis. Had male, female, younger, and older doctors tell me I was just anxious or dehydrated.
Took passing out in front of a doctor twice before they agreed it wasn't in my head. Turns out it was my heart.
You may have some younger doctors who are more aware but many doctors are not and patients are paying the price for that.
In my country young people's health complaints get dismissed often. First reaction is 'probably drug or drinking problem', second - 'probably starving yourself'
@F Actually a big problem with the medical community is the very thinking that "90% of the time it's simple". That's actually not being backed up with facts because doctors have been taught for generations that when you hear hoof beats, look for horses not zebras, but that came about in a time when we knew far less and were only studying white men. Today, with an ever increasing mix of genetic profiles and toxin exposures (the mercury and lead levels in my community are outrageous but the factories that produce them employ huge parts of the community and supply a big chunk of the electricity for the city of Chicago, so no one will stop them), it's just no longer reasonable to brush off a complaint of abnormal or extreme pain.
I nearly died from internal bleeding and uterine hemorrhaging from what was supposed to be a gentler abs safer form of birth control to help my completely out of whack hormones. There nurses even neglected to give the doctor the test results, that according to other specialists later were a red flag that should've resulted in hospitalization and a blood transfusion, and that it was a miracle I survived the blood loss. All because they were annoyed with me for calling twice in one week. Lucky for me, my Mom intervened when I confessed I'd passed out.
That doctor was responsible for the preventable deaths of at least a half dozen women we know of, but it wasn't until one has a rich enough husband to sue in civil court that criminal court did anything. And do you know what they did? 4 years, out in 2, and he's back with a full and highly profitable practice yet again, because people blamed the women for taking away their doctor, instead of blaming him for criminality negligent homicide of a new mother. We protect medical practitioners too much.
The nurse that sexually assaulted me in retaliation for demanding to be seen by a doctor and not just some 9 months to certified technician after a major accident and horrific back pain got away with and the head nurse even threatened to throw me out, without any evidence I was not suffering a spinal injury, and then had a cop come in and threaten me and my parents! Medical personal are treated as every bit above the law and common decency as police and it's created a system of abuse and fear for a huge chunk of the population.
Sorry for your difficulties, but the fact that it took that long with that many different doctors involved, makes it impossible to believe it had to do with bias.
@Fatter than I Look Lol.....that isn't how bias works.
@@sandwichrtist4556 um, yes it is. Innate bias can affect the group it is directed against, too- so, women can be biased against women, POC can be biased against POC. The self assured confidence with which you and @F claim to know the truth is Dunning-Kruger effect much. There's even a study showing bias against acknowledging bias, where they showed fake studies (which showed no bias) vs real studies (which did show bias) and asked which seemed most plausible. Literally your inability to recognise bias is a bias.
As my mom always said, "Not every doctor graduated med school with straight A's." There is always a spectrum of medical knowledge.
There is also a disparity of outside factors. Don't buy a car that was quality checked at 4:59pm on Friday.
You may actually want the doctor who didn’t get straight As. The straight A doctors aced tests written by the generation before them 😜
I failed to find the logic. Why would that be the assumption? I guess point taken, when given a choice, pick the doctor who did the worst in med school.@@tinawexler6547
@@tinawexler6547A student are the establishment, they hardly innovate, discover anything new or invent anything. They good at memorizing things and following directions. That’s why you see so many A students teaching or working with the government creating endless mean-less papers , C students starting business and B students working in them.
Absolutely. If you studied anything, you know that there were others that studied along with you that weren't particularly competent.
Doctors are people as anybody else. It doesn't mean that we should distrust them but it means that they're fallable and not every doc is doctor house.
I remember being told by a doctor that menstrual cramps were all in my head because there was blood and my mind associates blood with pain. I wished so hard he could experience this pain for just an hour.
I'm no medical expert, but if that's really how it worked... wouldn't the same level and frequency of pain be common among men over 20 years old?
Feel free to ask that doctor if, God forbid, you ever see him again.
The only pain comparable to menstrual cramps that I’ve experienced was labor with pitocin. Not even passing a kidney stone.
Ask for a female doctor?
I began cramping BEFORE my first flow, so no bloody presentation, and had no idea why I was in so much pain, so that doctor is a complete putz and should have his license revoked.
Neverminding that you often start cramping a week before...🙄
As a black woman, starting in high school, I began to have very bad knee pain. I had many, many years or trying to go to doctors and saying 'hey my knee hurts'. Painkillers and physical therapy didn't work. Nobody ever did xrays, and when they did, they only did one. Finally, after 14 years, when my knee gave out from under me, I got my very first female doctor. She believed me. She sent me to a sports injury doctor. I'd never really played sports, I'm an artist. But I went. And within one visit, he took several x-rays and did several different tests and came back with news that practically made me cry.
'I think I know what's wrong with your knee, and it must have hurt for a very long time.' He followed that up with 'If Physical Therapy doesn't help, then you may need surgery. If this had been seen sooner, it might have been reversible.' That kills me. Sooner? If I'd been seen sooner? If they had *listened* sooner. So now I have irreversible damage to my knee, the muscles around it, and my leg itself (making one leg nearly 6 cm's shorter than the other because of how warped the knee had become) and it could have been avoided if people had just...listened to me. It's permanent, I'm 30, and I can't walk without assistance or being on painkillers 24/7. But they won't give me knee surgery. It's not bad enough. Disability says very much the same thing.
"You're sick, but you're not sick enough."
That's been my experience.
I stopped going to the doctor for thing because I know things will just get brushed off. I was once sent to a hospital because I was throwing up blood (I had ulcers and lesions in my stomach and intestines) and they said 'hmm, you seem fine to me'. Until I threw up. Then they decided 'Yes, okay, I guess you might actually be sick.'
I’m so, so sorry. Your story makes me so angry. I hope you can find a treatment option that works for you.
I'm so sorry ma'am, I hope you find treatment that works for you. Reading this made me really mad, whoever your doctors were need to learn how to respect you and give you the treatment you need and I just want to tell you to stay strong because I wish the best for you.
sometimes even showing 'proof' of something being wrong doesn't help. And like you said, if only doctors would listen to patients more - and more important, believe them - that is the key. It took over 20 years before someone finally took me seriously enough about my "absolutely normal, no need to exaggerate, lady" period pain before someone did something.
@D.K That's the closest you can get I think: i.imgur.com/6Rv8Pp9.gif.
Look, what happened to you is absolutely tragic and I won't deny that, but you have to recognize that doctors are human, and sometimes they make mistakes or they miss something. A lot of times doctors want to avoid over-treating you, or misdiagnosing you. If a doctor looked at your knee and said, "Well it's not affecting your walking, or it might be something that will go away on its own, or it's not something that would need immediate treatment" or anything along those lines, then that's that, because if you didn't have anything wrong and they gave you painkillers or physical therapy or all these things that could cost you more money, only to find out later that nothing was wrong, then they would've wasted time and recources unnecessarily. Again, I feel bad for what happened and I hope everything works out for you, but you can't always blame the doctors for not seeing something.
If women experiencing heart attack symptoms “atypically” is so common, why are they still considered atypical symptoms just because men don’t experience them often?
Possibly because the existing literature is still weighted towards men, so those symptoms must be considered 'atypical' until further research with female patients shows otherwise? Or perhaps the symptoms truly are 'atypical' no matter what, but women end to experience those 'atypical' symptoms more often than men?
@@kouhaisempai4800 Nah, it's not that. The symptoms are basically the same for both sexes. The thing is these atypical symptoms can happen in both as well, but slightly more in females. So they're still hard to miss or confuse with something else because of the low rates but they're still not too common in women to by considered typical.
because women dont die of heart attacks
Casarek Boikovskiy that is absolutely not true. Women actually are more likely to do because their symptoms tend to go un/misdiagnosed more than men. Heart disease is the leading cause of death for both men and women in North America.
Men are "the norm" and anything that deviates from "the norm" is atypical. Yet we still have to read thinkpieces on how they're the most persecuted people ever. Odd.
I love how he talked about lightening the situation with patients. I’ve had a lot of severe medical problems and most of the doctors, while professional and good at their jobs, had not a funny bone in their family. I spent 30 weeks in a hospital due to a persistent kidney infection that ultimately resulted in a radical nephrectomy. But my doctor for this issue was super personable and we made jokes with each other all the time. Once he was out of town for his own wedding and I became septic while he was gone and I jokingly blamed it on him for daring to get married while I was sick. And he joked back with “I tried to tell my wife I had to watch you but she insisted on it” we traded funny little jokes the entire time I was stuck there and it made the ordeal much more bearable. When it came time to take the kidney out I pulled out a stress ball that was shaped like a kidney and I have it to him right before the surgury and told him maybe he could fit that one in as a replacement 😂 he’s a great doctor and he has it on his desk. Some doctors are really great and some shouldn’t have been admitted to med school.
The ones who slip through the cracks and graduate to go on to becoming humourless doctors should be mandated to take improv.
@@riverboris federally-subsidized residency at UCB
I wish you'd gone over the uterine cancer study that was only performed on men.
God help me, I MUST be reading this wrong.
What mastermind came out with such nonsense and who funded it? 😂😭
@@jinijinxer97 nope it happened in the 90s the ACA wanted to do a study on the rates and causes of ovarian cancer and uterine cancer in women and listed all the studied patients as men.
@@sersastark For all things that is holy & not, someone please tell me how at not even one point, someone went "What the heck are we doing?"
He basically did, mentioning how ridiculous those kinds of studies were and that they "...just dont apply to everyone" due to being tests run purely on men
About the maternal mortality rate only being higher because of the new reporting method... Even if it should be 9.8, that still puts us at the bottom of the developed world - the only country we skip ahead of by using the older, lower number is New Zealand. I love that you pointed out that the study concludes it's because of the new reporting... but knowing that doesn't really change our ranking in the developed world doesn't really make me feel better. Even if it was half of what it currently is, we'd still be the worst. Bummer.
If you haven't covered this, it would be amazing if you tackled the topic of healthcare in the US and how it compares to the rest of the world. As a POC I especially have concerns about the system and hope my wife does not have complications when she is pregnant.
Dude! I subscribe to you Knowing better. Awesome to see you here 2
Thank you!
Lexi Airey ...the difference in definition does not drastically change the number. Infant mortality is also drastically higher in the USA than other developed countries. The us healthcare system is in crisis. The sooner you accept it, the sooner you can address it.
I love your channel and was coming down here to actually comment this myself. Glad you beat me to it, you worded it much more concisely than I would've been able to lol.
That’s great that you don’t see color/gender. But I can assure you as a former Spanish language interpreter for several hospital systems, and even in the dental field where I work now, there is plenty of racial/gender bias and dismissal that happens from providers of all ages/genders/ethnicities.
Owen McLaughlin I mean they’re not wrong tho. Someone who’s against homosexuals for example isn’t necessarily going to believe what they’re doing is wrong and will believe they aren’t prejudiced
He never said there was no discrimination. Quite the opposite
@@Hydratiun That's not what he said. He said that everyone has biases. That's true, and it's important to be aware of you're biases so that you don't give in to them. If people assume that they are free of biases, then they are not thinking critically about their biases, and that's dangerous.
@@danielwhitlock6499 of course, it's also important that we aren't overaware of biases, overcorrection can be dangerous too, but that's a ***much*** less significant problem in the world today, and exists almost exclusively as a hypothetical problem rather than an actual problem people have dealt with yet and shouldn't be incentive for anyone to be *less* aware.
I gave a thumbs down because that is sad.
In one of my nursing classes, one of my classmates said, “I just don’t know if I could give a patient who’s a drug addict opioids.” And my instructor replied, “Well, that’s not your job to decide.”
Doctors do have to weigh a person's addiction against pain seeking behavior. So addiction does matter, and if someone has an addiction problem, then they should try everything they can to avoid waking up that addiction.
@@dantevairos This is an interesting point; however, I think there is more to be considered. Yes, addiction is a problem, and drug addictions are absolutely bad for someone's health... but what I think you are missing is where addictions come from.
**note: before you read further, recognize that what I discuss below is not a fully-fledged article but rather a brief foray into a few of the more relevant points. I ask that any critical response be made solely on what is discussed, and anything beyond that be legitimate questions to explore the concept in greater depth. In other words, please respond in good faith so that we may have a meaningful discussion, thanks**
Addictions, by and large, can be reliably shown to have been brought about by a mental health condition in the patient. Specifically, addictions are a form of unhealthy coping mechanism to help escape from the issues someone has in their life, be it through a momentary surge of pleasure, disassociation, or otherwise. Furthermore, it is now being shown that in many cases, it may be more effective to treat the underlying mental health issues; once they are treated and controlled, the addiction disappears.
I bring this up to make this point, if someone is worried about a patient being an addict, depriving them of their addiction does not solve the issue. Evidence shows the addict will turn to other sources, like drug dealers. This introduces the additional issue of the fact that all too often, these drugs will be laced with more addictive drugs to try to work the patient through the pipeline to make it more difficult to escape their addiction. With all that in mind, one can look at the situation like this:
A patient has come in seeking an opioid, and the medical practitioner is worried that they are an addict seeking a fix. They have two options: A) prescribe them a medical opioid certified to be pure and be no more addicting than it should be, or B) deny them, which will almost certainly lead to them getting the cartel drug that may be laced with more addictive drugs, moving them down the pipeline.
In this light, I would argue that it would be best for the practitioner, regardless of the addiction status, to prescribe the patient the drug to ensure the receive the safest version of the drug. Furthermore, this will allow for the development of a level of trust between the patient and the medical system, leading to them returning more, allowing their addiction to be tracked, and leading to a higher likelihood of a later recommendation for the patient to seek therapy to be successful. All this is naturally reliant on the decriminalization of drug addiction and substance abuse.
Despite its length, this is merely the tip of the iceberg that is this concept, but it should hopefully shed enough light to at least show that it is an avenue worth exploring, if for nothing more than to show why it may be incorrect.
In any case, to circle back to the Op's comment: Not only would it not be their job to decide, it is not their job to treat. Addictions are being shown more and more to be an extension of mental health issues, and are thus an issue to be dealt with by Therapists, not ER doctors or nurses.
And this is why America has an opioid crisis.
@@en--ev Most nurses are not allowed to prescribe any medication so it is literally not their job to decide.
@@en--ev The nurse's job is to take care of the patient in line with the doctor's instructions. The doctor's job is to determine whether a patient requires a prescription. America has an opioid 'crisis' for a number of reasons. Nurses somehow being the cause is not one of them.
I'm pregnant with my second child. When i went to emergency in excruciating pain on the left side of my body the female dr on duty in emergency did blood tests and a scan and was trying to find out what was wrong... when the male dr clocking in came as she was finishing her shift he told me i was fine and that aches and pains in pregnany is normal. Which i know but also knew that that pain was definitely not just a pregnany symptom. My gynea is at a different hospital so they wouldn't call one there to help me. The male dr discharged me with panado....
I phoned my gynea who got the other hospital to send her the results of the urine, blood tests and scans as well as any notes made... i turned out to have a colon infection.
Sasha Dos reis mendes OMG 😮
That's one bad medic. Did you just said he never saw the results or did he read them and did know what it was? That's a very shitty medic.
My late dad was diagnosed with kidney stones for three days and when a specialist came all the doctors got a hard lecture when she (specialist) got to know that my father got his appendix burst for three days when it should've been the first day. Fortunately all went well and he lived for another 5-6 years before he passed away because of a heart attack.
😑😶😮🙆
Um you do realize that medical errors are extremely common right because medicine is some magic that jesus will shoot at you to heal you
It took almost a decade for a doctor to listen to me. "You're just emotional, it's just in your head" Turns out it was, I have lesions from multiple sclerosis.
I'm so sorry. That is the worst and I hope you're feeling better
Ali Joy I was told it was in my head too, for 3 years. It was, because my pain all stemmed from an overactive central nervous system that controls the rest of my body.
@@micahmosse3876 I was officially diagnosed in 2017, thanks to a younger female doctor who believed me. I'm on Tysabri now. And thank you ❤
@@ishie0196 I'm so sorry. I hope you're okay and are getting the care and treatment you need.
@@alijoy1721 going to a female doctor made a HUGE difference for me too! I'm glad you're getting the treatment you need
Dr Mike, I think you see a clear dichotomy between personal bias and systemic bias. Unfortunately, systemic bias informs personal bias. A hospital which treats more black people is less likely to have appropriate resources, thus a doctor there is under more pressure, sees more patients who have obvious substance abuse issues, and ends up relying more on biased heuristics that result in worse health outcomes.
It's not the doctor's immediate fault that they don't have the time to spend with each patient, because the hospital doesn't have enough staff, because the hospital doesn't have the budget, because it is in a poor area which unfortunately has a higher proportion of blacks vs whites. But to the patient on the end of that chain, the result is the same.
And you're right in saying it might not be obvious to a med student that blacks have the same pain sensitivity as whites. That may be because they grew up in an area that, for most of its history, actively propagated the lie that blacks don't feel pain like whites do. That lie is racist, and unfortunately it doesn't stop being racist just because it's been passively accepted by a young person who is learning to be a doctor.
It's good that things are getting better, it's good that these things are being addressed. But to properly deal with medical bias, doctors and nurses and med students and whoever will have to confront that some of their beliefs or actions were racist or sexist or homophobic, or many other uncomfortable words. Through that, patients will get better outcomes even in a system which is, in itself, biased towards people who are white, male, and wealthy.
THIS!! love mike, but he talks a lot about “its better” in defense of the medical industry
And tell me, who forbids you to be wealthy?
@@MrShyghost And tell us, who forbids you from taking off your rose-tinted glasses?
So well said!
I think what Dr. Mike pointed out about those students was their lack of knowledge about these things and he wasn't defending a racist mindset. It's like saying that most engineering students prefer material A over material B and then the whole populace loses it and will think that the entire construction industry reflects that view just because of some students who aren't even engineers yet.
I was so heart broken watching this, it brought me back to my aunt, she had a high fever for a few days, went to the emergency room with our uncle, when explaining her symptoms the doctor told her to put on her big girl hat and go home with Tylenol. She was so out of it because of the fever she would have hadn’t my uncle being there to help her actually get some testing. Her brain was swollen and had she gone home she would have died.
This happen less than ten years ago in arizona.
That's fcking HORRIFYING!!!!!!! 😔 😔 😠 😡 😤
I hope she is doing better today!
I don't think I've ever met a woman who, when asked, couldn't describe an instance in which her health concerns were dismissed by a doctor. Personally, I can give you multiple examples. I'm only 25.
I was in hospital for emergency surgery, a week later I left hospital with a prescription for paracetamol, I told the male doctor I was not happy leaving with only paracetamol as I was in crippling agony, he dismissed me and said I just needed sleep, I literally staggered out the hospital in tears I was in so much pain, I got home and the pain was so intense I threw up non stop and rushed back into the emergency department, the female nurse who did my evaluation opened her mouth so wide she looked like a goldfish when she saw how little pain relief I had been given. Left 4 hours later with a lot of morphine and a non-apology apology. It was probably the worst pain of my life, and it was entirely avoidable.
In my experience those doctors who wouldn't listen to me and were dismissive were also female. I'm very hesitant to see a female doctor because they've - to a woman - been dismissive of issues found after seeking a third or fourth opinion.
@@violetelin1901 I'm sure there are some women who behave this way, but mostly because they're educated by a system that breeds this issue. Its only that sometimes you're lucky enough to find a practitioner who is better. MOST of the time that practitioner is a young female. But not always.
@@violetelin1901 the important thing to remember is that it's the material and method of their education that's created the issue and needs to be resolved. Just because a few good doctors rise above doesn't mean the issue is fixed.
Annabel Summer I’ve only had one experience with an actual hospital but it was pretty good, clinics on the other hand are a hit or miss, sometimes they give me the wrong type of antibiotic for an ear infection (I went elsewhere and they said an oral one would do nothing and prescribed an ear drop) and I feel like I often get overprescribed stuff. On the other hand when I was younger I went to the local clinic and my parents said they think the person who gave me a nosebleed from a flu swab test was drunk since they collapsed as soon as they left the room and they said that he seemed drunk as well.
An incident with my dad at home when I was 12 lead me to hyperventilate. My parents rushed me to an urgent care center. They gave me medicine to calm down and the doctor spoke to my dad about what was wrong. The doctor said this is just a case of “hysterical womens syndrome” and they had a chuckle about it.
I never forgot that and have had to continually fight for care since. I went to the ER with lower abdominal pain so severe I nearly fainted. The doctor ran 0 tests and I was never offered any pain medication. I was told it was just bad cramps. I went to Planned Parenthood that same week and turns out I had a softball sized ovarian cyst displacing my organs and beginning to twist my Fallopian tube.
I'm so sorry that happened to you. That is horrible!
Sithean it's also common.
But but, maybe it’s not the whole story, maybe you went to an underfunded hospital and I’m sure you’ll be happy to hear they made progress. That’s true. They talk about it during fundraising when sipping champagne 🤣
Ezekiel2517 oh, I've never been to an underfunded hospital, and I've been dismissed plenty. You didn't know the half of the story.
zee zee It’s sad but I guess I have to point out the obvious sarcasm in my comment.
My mom has MS. The first doctor she saw accused her of being a “bored house wife with too much time on her hands to overthink things”
Omg thats horrible
jujitsujew23 thats so unprofessional
he was right
Whoa!
I had a friend whose doctor, without doing a single test, said that her severe pain was because she was an older woman and still single, and was having anxiety about that. And when she just kind of went 'what? Why would you even think that?' His response was, 'that's always the case when women your age are single.'
looks like they get you single or married - considered the woman's fault, either way. :-/ .
17:20 There's a really important distinction between medicine/genetics and sociology that needs to be made here. Race is, exclusively, a sociological construct. You should _not_ use race as an indicator for someone's medical treatment. Ethnicity and genetic background, however, are valuable for medicine. If someone was born within a certain group of individuals or has a family history dating back to a certain region that may have experienced certain genetic events, then there is reason to give that patient a different treatment.
As someone studying anthropology, I thank you for pointing this out
Indeed. There might be biological differences along lines that happen to parallel our perceptions of “race”, but those are still social constructs. The origin of those biological differences originate from, like you said, genetic frequency variations amongst ethnic groups coming from certain parts of the world.
this. cringed through that entire segment.
"Description: While race is ascribed to individuals on the basis of physical traits, ethnicity encompasses everything from language, to nationality, culture, and religion."
And it's the physical traits that matter in medicine, not what language you speak. "If someone was born within a certain group of individuals" - you mean like they are of a certain race? Old "science" on race was partially based on nothing but racism, that was wrong, that does not mean races does not exist.
@@peterpan4948I think he means stuff more like this: I’m white but specifically Mediterranean so I would be more likely to have Familial Mediterranean Fever, beta thalassemia, or certain other diseases which are not endemic in other white ethnicities. The BRCA gene is more common in Ashkenazi Jews, but not in Sephardic Jews - same race , different ethnicities.
it took me 10 years to be diagnosed with endometriosis. 10 years of gynecology visits where my pain was written off as normal and my other symptoms dismissed. 6 doctors. When my first surgery was done, my gynecologist came up to me after and told me he had no idea how I was able to stand. I firmly believe that we would be so much closer to a cure for (or even a cause of) endo if it effected men
There was a study published on endometriosis in 2013 I saw briefly yesterday.
Done by male doctors.
I kid you not: the thesis: "Are women with endo more or less attractive than women without endo."
Attractive. They got FUNDING for this garbage.
Not satire: www.physiciansweekly.com/women-with-endometriosis-more-attractive/
@@Bethgael what the actual hell???
@@Bethgael What in the actual fuck!?
Like seriously, what kind of bullshit is that?!
So glad you were able to get diagnosed! Also glad to see so much talk about endometriosis the last 2 years. It runs in my family & even with this family history everyone has horror stories. My poor aunt needed surgery to remove the massive cysts in her fifties. When she told her doctor about the pain she was experiencing, he looked her dead in the eye and asked if she was sure it wasn't "imaginary pain." (She was an unmarried 50 yo teacher, who probably fit his outdated ideas about wanting attention perfectly).
So many women just power through endometriosis pain, and I don't know how they do it. I've experienced major surgery and nerve damage from a car accident and it doesn't come close to the pain from endometriosis.
Same thing happened to me. I even said to my doctor that I thought it was Endo but she didn't listen. Was diagnosed during major surgery for removing fibroids. Doc apologized for not listening to me sooner.
I had a back fracture once - I was in pain for a few days and couldn't sit before I went to the doctor. He refused to ask for an x-ray because it would expose my ovaries to unnecessary radiation. Dude, screw my ovaries, my back's broken!
How'd that happen?
@@steven21736 I went swimming at this waterfall, it was naturally super slippery, and I just slipped and fell. It was only a small fracture, in a small, lower bone, but the drive home was hell lol
it's so sus when doctors worry more about a potential pregnancy/potential fetus than your immediate health needs.
@@sholem_bond It creeps me out...
yes, yes, you are a woman.. do your duty to society first, have a bunch of kids and then care for your pain... maybe. Seriously, these doctors see women only in a certain light with only one purpose in life, it is infuriating
The big question I keep getting as I'm watching this video, is "So why *exactly* do the Black neighborhoods have the crappier hospitals.... " IT's BIAS. (Systems don't fund those hospitals as well, they don't get to hire the best of staff that's out there... they don't get the best equipment, or have the best ability to keep equipment running..."
And yes, I spend over a dozen years with chronic illness from an undiagnoised abcessed appendix, that even when it finally became accute and I landed in the ER, told me it was something viral and I'd be fine.... (and a week later was in emergency surger) at no point in that dozen years had ANY of my doctors tested for thyroid issues nor ran a white cell count...
I was told TO MY FACE that I was just lazy and needed to get my act together.
I developed thyroid issues in my 30s as well. Spoke to him about exhaustion and got little to no reaction. Then my mom told me she got diagnosed with hashimotos thyroiditis and I should get tested because the symptoms are the same. I asked my GP to test my thyroid and was told I'm too young for thyroid issues. Mentioned my mom having hashimotos and had my thyroid test the same day. Turned out I had low thyroid function and they caught it early. Now if I ask for a test he listens and will at least discuss it with me. If I insist on it despite him saying it's not necessary he will do it.
I remember a different GP who I spoke to about my ADHD. I asked him to test me because I had the same symptoms as my husband who was on medication for it. My hubby had given me a couple of doses of his meds to see if they would work and they did. We knew I likely didn't need his lvl though so I wanted my GP to test me. Instead he prescribed me the exact same meds my husband was on at the same dosage, told me to take one per day for two weeks then two per day for two weeks then come back and see him. So I did as told, started at 36mg daily then doubled after 2 weeks then at the end of that month booked a double appointment on a Saturday to see this twit (as he requested) by which point I was literally bouncing off walls, emotionally a wreck and confused. He took one look at me, told me nobody could help me I'm crazy and should see a shrink then kicked me out his rooms. I was less than amused. I immediately stopped all those meds and booked an appointment to see my current GP (who is a founder member of my medical practice). I explained everything to him and he was horrified. He started me on 10mg of those meds which worked brilliantly. That other GP? Yeah I never went back to him and about three months later he left to work in Australia.
Talking about discrepancies in funding in medicine is difficult in that SO many societal factors intersect with each other in relation to how they each impact medicine. History of redlining, segregation, racist science practices, etc. Dr. Mike could probably do an entirely new video talking about just that because everything is SO interwoven together. It truly is a systemic problem.
That's what happens when you treat your healthcare system as a commercial for-profit entity...
Infuriating!!
@Bio1993Hsapien If you blame the US to be all about money, you are forcing people to be *good* and pay for their poorer counterparts' healthcare. Charity is well and good, but not so when it is forced. What I don't understand is why people are hell-bent on blaming the US by comparing it to their European counterparts. It's just that the Europeans have stronger communal feelings and want to support each other even if it meant a slacker would have to be supported by the working class. On the other hand, Americans simply care about themselves and their immediate surroundings. They are not concerned with the well-being of their fellow citizens in another neighbourhood that's not theirs'. It's just how they want to be and forcing people to be altruistic is cruel.
I spent some time in the hospital and then my husband spent some time in the hospital, same hospital. While we were there for very different things, I starkly noticed a difference in how the doctors both LISTENED to him and automatically BELEIVED him. Whereas, I had to constantly repeat myself and almost felt like I was begging them to listen to me and believe that I know my body. This is just MY PERSONAL observation and I was shocked at how much easier it was for my husband to explain his needs and get them met.
I wanted to mention that I am a white woman, so I cannot imagine how much harder it would have been to be a woman of color.
07:30 “Maybe doctors are unaware of women’s biology” well I sure hope they’re not. Because then they shouldn’t be doctors.
You missed this part 9:05
And this part also 10:10 we are different.
they aren't and they shouldn't
Showaib Zaman yes we are. I just happen to think doctors of medicine should also know about the biology of the other 51% of the population. Kinda controversial right?
This just in, complex multicellular life "really not that simple".
I appreciate your point of view. Not dismissing that bias is a valid component of the problem, but also offering other reasons and measures that must be taken to lower the harmful effects that racial, gender, and socioeconomic bias may be playing in our care.
Simply just raging is not helpful and I really believe that more doctors like you will help create real change within this issue.
Agreed. I have alot of family who are, to put it plainly, bad with doctors. Their inability to provide relevent information and understand what they are told, and do it, has lead to worse medical outcomes for themselves. The human part of me feels sorry for people who have bad experiences. The cynical part of me wants to know how much they are to blame for their difficulties.
Cassie W
Yes!! I agree completely!
Also john Oliver wasnt saying it was all just individual doctors being racist/sexist. It's a systemic issue. Yes doctors have biases, but most of those we taught. Or more accurately due to being taught poorly. But it's not just the education. People of color shouldn't have access to only poor hospitals. There are many issues at play. John oliver didnt have time to go into all the possible causes and all the possible solutions. He just wanted to make sure that people are aware that there is a problem that needs to be addressdd.
I just felt like applausing after reading this.
Cassie, we are not raging. Black women like yourself I suppose are dying in childbirth. we can't address glossing over the uncomfortable facts as Dr. Mike did in the video. Do you know the story of Serena Williams and the fact that she almost died in chid birth despite have all the money in the world? They didn't listen to her concerns about pain.
There is TV Judge Hatchett who's daughter died in law died while giving birth in a similar heart breaking scenario. All the money that family had did not change the outcome because her symptoms were ignored by the staff.
I appreciate your important input but educated women as yourself have to shine light on this matters.
Every single woman I know has at least 3 stories of medical professionals not listening to them or treating them differently. I have about a dozen. I'm 21.
I'm afab (assigned female at birth) but I dont have a story like this. And I know exactly why. It's because I cant afford a doctor.
@@unusvita5719 What did this contribute to the original comment???
@@mybirdsareangry1 l was just pointing out that I was born female and havent experienced this. But I pointed out that this was only because I'm too poor to afford a doctor
Yup. I'm 35 and I have a lifetime of stories.
I am pretty certain I have an inflammatory disease and have yet to be referred to the rheumatologist. I get sent to the opthamologist, dermatologist, prescribed all kinds of anti-inflammatories and inhalers to treat all these symptoms I have but can't get a referral to figure out what the core problem is.
I’m male, but I also want to add that this happens to “young and healthy” looking people of any gender when they come in with a health issue. I started my first symptoms of Parkinson’s at 29, but wasn’t taken seriously until my symptoms were bad enough by age 33 to diagnose me. Literally had a guy look at his watch while I was giving a patient history, and another took a phone call and left the room for 20 minutes.
I have a chronic medical condition, for which I need to regularly see neurologists. I went to a new one a couple of years ago (because I moved to another state for a while.) He asked me about the condition I was there for, so I started to describe it in detail, (because it's a complicated condition, and for me a fairly complicated history. He interrupted me after a minute or so and said something like "Get to the point" while looking at his watch. I thought, I was telling him what I thought was important, not meandering along in telling my story. So. Never went back there again.
Ugh, I’m so sorry this happened to you.
Yup! I’m a woman so that definitely has affected my experience but also I have had a couple doctors offhandedly say “well you’re young” or something of that variation right before they didn’t take my symptoms seriously lmao. Also to add: never admit to a physical doctor that you have anxiety or depression. It’s an awful thing feeling like we have to leave that out but yeah when my anxiety was bad, my doctor kept giving me diagnoses that were basically kitchen sink diagnoses and tried to suggest it was a manifestation physical of my anxiety lmao. Like, no dude, there’s a literal lump in my neck wtf. He didn’t even bother to feel the lump either. A med student at my third appt to try to address this issue with my primary care physician finally did feel my neck and went oh yeah that’s your thyroid.
As a woman with endometriosis, it baffles me how often I've been in excruciating, debilitating, suicidal-thoughts-inducing pain, and people (including medical professionals) just flat-out don't believe me when I tell them how much pain I'm in. Somehow, I can't imagine a doctor telling a _man_ that the reason they're in pain is because they're just sensitive.
This. It's like periods are expected to be painful so since its related to a period you must be a wimp. Or. Maybe. Just maybe. There is a serious issue here?
I suffer from chronic pain for several reasons and I'm male and the same thing happened to me more than twice! telling me I'm just over sensitive and that nothing's wrong, the doctors were wrong in all cases for years! =[ now finally treated for fibromyalgia IBS and got surgery done on my shoulders all three of those were dismissed as me being too sensitive to pain... I don't mean to disagree with you or anything I understand that its a bias that exists ,but anyone can be left unheard by medical professionals not even by bias or malice or anything just happens =[
Same. I was told it would go away with pregnancy. I was 16!!!!
I hope you’re getting the treatment now and can tolerate it. I can’t as mine is connected to my bladder.
@@bonia15 sigh… Women are consistently treated that way. By doctors in many fields. I was told by my optometrist that what happened to me, was all in my head.
When I went in for a bladder infection, a dr. Told me I needed to wipe better.
I’ve had drs do pregnancy tests on me without my knowledge or permission.
I told one of my surgeons and the anesthesiologists NOT to give me morphine, it doesn’t work on me. Guess what happened? They didn’t listen, and put me on morphine after my surgery.
I can go on with a lot of examples of drs being biased. I also know so many women who have had similar experiences.
You are one out of many. It doesn’t make bias in medical care any different for women.
If you were treated that way, then you should be able to empathize with women more and what we deal with , across the board. The “not all men” trope is overused, or trying to make a comparison is showing me and others that you truly don’t get it- you, as man, will still get better care than women. You will still be heard and taken more seriously than women.
My cancer went undiagnosed for two years because of medical bias. I’ve been told my pain is all in my head. Let that sink in.
Women , can’t get a hysterectomy without jumping through tons of hoops. Even though I had endometriosis.
Medical bias is a serious problem and I'm glad that it's being spoken about more in the mainstream. My history with doctors has not been the greatest. Being black and overweight most of my life, I felt my issues were brushed aside. Ultimately, I stopped going all together at one point.
A couple of years back I was experiencing abdominal pain, diarrhea and vomiting. It went on for several days before I was taken in to the hospital by an ambulance. I was waiting in pain for hours until the doctor saw me. He asked a few questions and did a urine and stool test. I kept telling him I was in severe pain and that it had been going on for a while however, he would just interrupt me or diminish my symptoms. Before the results of all the tests came in, I was sent home and told that I MAY have a virus. I was only told to take gravol and wait it out. Now understand the hospital was not busy at all nor was there a need to hurry me out to let a more severe patient have the bed. Also, the hospital is one of the best in Toronto and was in an affluent area. We also have universal health care so there wasn't a question of whether insurance could cover my stay or not.
The next two days were the most painful in my life. I couldn't eat, sleep and could barely breath. The pain was only getting worse. My parents could not see me in pain anymore and took me to a different hospital. I immediately felt the care was different. This hospital was more busy, had less doctors and could be considered to have a higher percentage of minority patients. The doctor gave me something to reduce my pain and sent me to several tests. I waited in the hospital for ALL the results and was sent to their sister hospital for imaging. Turns out I had a large gal stone that was exacerbated by a severe case of salmonella infection. My whole gi tract was inflamed and my gallbladder was so infected that the doctor said I need to remove it asap and if I came in later, it could have burst and killed me.
The first doctor was not under pressure, the hospital was not under staffed, nor were they underfunded. They were just biased. They didnt believe my pain nor were they empathetic to my plight. The second doctor WAS under pressure, the hospital WAS under staffed (he was the only doctor on the floor at the time) and it was well in to the night so he was probably tired as well. However he still took the time to listen to me and treated me well. This was just another case of a doctor letting their misconceptions get in the way of standard of care practices. I do not buy the idea of a hospital lacking in some way or being in a poor area causes these issues. There is a difference between not beinng able to help and being indifferent or uncaring. Bias can exist in all areas.
It kind of felt like Dr. Mike was being a bit too defensive here. I understand that there are mprovements on the way and that John Oliver glossed over some key points but not every practice/hospital is like Dr. Mike's. There are amazing doctors (the majority) out there like the one who helped me with my gal stone issue but there are also dismissive and irresponsible ones as well. Although I do applauded his optimism, that's not going to do much about the trauma people experience each day. I hope that the medical field as a whole can go through a relearning and that all doctors can trained better whether they just graduated or have been in practice for 50 years.
***I'd like to note that this is not the first time a doctor underestimated my pain or the severity of my symptoms. This is just the only time it could have killed me. Not long ago one doctor asked me if I wanted to be sick when I questioned what could be wrong with me when a test came out negative.
And they were ALL fat shaming racists. Thanks for your stories.
Thank you for sharing your experiences
What you've written is making me cry, and only partly from sympathy. I've had such hurtful intaeractions with doctors that I can't bring myself to go anymore. I've had a lot of health problems, so I should go but (it sounds pathetic) but I just can't. I am strong in a lot of ways, but you are so vunerable in a doctor's office, especially when you are seriously sick. I don't know how to pull out of this anxiety.
Elfin 27 I feel you (am there @ 43) and wish I could help you. Is there anyone that could go with you? We deserve good heath regardless of weight, sex or race. God bless and I pray you find healthful relief soon ❤️
AishaLuv that's an awful thing to go through :( I,m so sorry, so glad you're here to tell your story
I wish doctors and the media would stop referring to the “American Healthcare System”. We don’t have a healthcare system. We have healthcare providers and hospital systems and insurance companies. This does not make a system because it does not provide coordinated care.
Absolutely. Poor USA.
true glad to be european!
@@zestorm6233 Same here
Semantics
Yup...that's a system.
There was a doctor that called me a hypochondriac TO MY FACE and I was in the middle of my first major exacerbation, caused by a later diagnosis of multiple sclerosis. I figure, if a doctor isn't familiar with the symptoms a patient is exhibiting, help them find someone who is.
"Maybe doctors are unaware of women's biology." Great.
Yeah, they shouldn’t have license to practice medicine if that’s the case. Like how is that even an excuse?
@@KooblyK It sounds like that is referring to the fact that most medicine information used to be based on the male anatomy. So, if you don't have a lot of actual experience dealing with women, all you knowledge is going to be based on that.
Thomas yeah. That’s horrifying. Why are you not horrified?
@@ThunderStruck15 Because there's no need to express emotions on UA-cam?
@@Shade01982 there is not a need for you to feel that way. but i am sure at a time or another did you feel emotionally driven by something you've seen on UA-cam, whether it be anger or worry or scared.
As a woman I had three men gynecologists that told me if I could just deal with the pain I should and you’ll change your mind on kids and my personal favorite “what does your husband think.” It took a female that listened to me to get taken care of.
Why are man gynos even i thing? Aren't there enough women doctors to cover this area? Let men treat men genitalia and women treat women genitalia. I guess if someone really wants one of the opposite sex, they should be allowed to choose differently, but I can't image why anyone would want that.
@@dumbledoor9293 I personally have had the opposite experience with male gynecologist. I found that the male OBGYN's actually listened to me a lot more because they knew they couldn't relate to what I was going through and therefore had to trust my opinion. The female OBGYNs ended up being the most dismissive because they felt they already knew what I was going through because, and I quote, "they are women too." So what that often led to was female doctors not believing me because they felt they already knew how I "should" feel because they are women too. So I wouldn't immediately write off male doctors because female doctors can be equally as dismissive. I have actually had better experiences with male OBGYNs.
@@MrsTruthTeller same experience here… both with GYNs and OBs. My female OB “mmhmm, morning sickness can be rough, but it should subside soon” (this was at 16 weeks of pregnancy where I ate next to nothing since week 3). My male OB “wow, you’re having trouble holding down water?! That’s not good, we can give you something to help with that if you want”.
It's crazy we women couldn't possibly know if we want to have kids or not. I knew very early and everyone thought I would change my mind. I have not.
@@dumbledoor9293 in Sweden you can demand a women gynecologist. We have men too, but we have the right to switch.
I remember my mom telling me about a friend of hers that started sounding like she was slurring her words when they talked on a phone. She had gone to er doctor who did a few CAT scans, but only found what he told her was just 'old scarring'? But he basically treated her like she was fine and was just worrying about natural signs of getting old.
When my mom was able to go over and check on her, she realized the reason she was slurring her words because the entire left side of her body was limp. Took her right up to the ER and yeah, no, not 'old bruises' she'd had three stokes.
That was the first time I suspected when I heard she was slurring her words. A doctor should have suspected it right off.
Omg. Slurred speech and drooping/unable to use one side of the body is classic for stroke.
My mom was sent home numerous times because her exhaustion/fatigue and inability to catch her breath was "just your diabetes & fibromialgia" But they did actually find (about a week before she died) that she had breast cancer that had spread to her lungs so at least they took her seriously once she had lungs full of black tar cancer goo and was on her literal deathbed.
I am so sorry for your loss, and I wish for those medical providers who kept dismissing your mum to never find a comfortable sleeping position again.
I'm so sorry! That's horribly unfair.
The one comment I'll always come back to in regards to our medical system is a sentiment expressed on The Daily Show (pretty sure it was when Jon Stewart was the host, now that I think about it) - "We have the best healthcare system in the world *if* you can afford it."
the best in the world? isnt doctor screw ups like the third leading cause of death in the us? maybe thats old data, but even so, there are way better healthcare systems in other countries
@@hattarapilvi yes almost all african states :D
@@hattarapilvi Not really, nearly every European fund raiser for health costs is for sending someone to the US to get a certain treatment only offered there.
Governments here have to make funding decisions and European markets don't really have competitive markets and funding systems to create new treatments
@@ciangibbons6643 I am not sure this statement is true. If you want to send somebody for GREAT medical care a lot of countries in europe and asia are a much much much better choice then the US. the "competitive markets and funding sytems" only means that treatments are developed for rich white people at a very very high price point. Also it means that the system is optimised to extract as much money from sick people as possible. curing a patient is a very bad business decision, this is the reason why medical research is only concentrating on certain conditions with a very high profit margin.
Honestly, i belief the US has one of the most sick cultures on the planet and the health system is just a reflection on it. The country is #1 for stupidity and total ignorance for how fucked up the society actually is.
So in summary, maybe people in the US should collect money to get send to other countries as the value generated by healthcare is much higher elsewhere.
Just to question your point of view:
www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/issue-briefs/2020/jan/us-health-care-global-perspective-2019
@@ciangibbons6643 Interesting. I'm from Czech Republic and not once in my life have I heard about a patient send to US for better or specialized treatment. I have, however, heard about quite a few other patients from around the world, including the US to come here for specialized care. Especially for cutting edge, brand new specialized treatments that no one in the world can at the time yet perform. I actually cannot remember the last time I read or heard anything in the news that said that the US developed something truly innovative. Maybe in QI with Stephen Fry, I watched like a year ago on youtube, where some scientists at an American university found out it takes a maximum of 10 regular steps to spill your drink.
And It really shouldn't be about a competition to develop some cure first to make money, but about trying to heal the most patients. Also we here actually have to pay for our health insurance, so nobody is afraid to go to a doctor with a broken leg in the fear he may have to pay medical bills for the rest of his/her life.
You forgot this gem: Medical research has long treated male bodies as the default, since women have those “pesky hormones” that muddy the results-even in studies on uterine cancer.
Yes, I notice he didn't touch the uterine research done on men.
What really grated on me was even with the discussion of how men should not be treated as the default, he says how we should be aware of how women present with heart attacks "atypically". It's only atypical if the male presentation is "typical".
I noticed he didn't even respond to it either. I feel like he was super defensive in this to the point where his response was actually racist and sexist. Whether or not he realized it.
Yes, Male mice have been considered easier to experiment with. Is that the best way, maybe not but it is reality.
@@markc471 That doesn't mean we need to accept reality or push for the reality to change.
When my little brother was 4, he started feeling nauseous, he wouldn't eat and we were very concerned, my parents took him to a doctor who said it was probably food poisoning, but this went on for days, he was losing weight and throwing up everything he ate. He woke up one night when we were staying away from home during a holiday, and he was so weak he couldn't even cry. My mom rushed him to the hospital along with my older sister, while my dad stayed to watch us. According to my sister and mother, the doctor there seemed to think my mother was just a young, new black mother who was overreacting (my mom was in her 40s with 7 kids), she exhausted my brother, said there was nothing wrong with him and was incredibly dismissive and rude. Thankfully, another doctor came in who took my mom seriously and found out what was wrong with my brother; his intestines had become entangled which was why he couldn't digest food and wouldn't eat. They performed surgery on him and were able to save his life, after staying in the hospital for around two weeks, he made a complete recovery.
Intestinal malrotation? That’s what my son had when he was born! He had to have surgery for it at like three days old. At first I wasn’t sure as the other people I told about his symptoms were just like oh he’s just born he’s just tired, etc. If it wasn’t for my husband I might not have taken him to the Er.
I'm so glad he recovered but the poor little guy shouldn't have had to go through that. Good thing the other doctor came in or he would probably have died.
this is madness1!!!!
@@leealexander3507 agreed. the first MD should be sued for malpractice.
@@FollowmedowntheNumberWhole Absolutely
Dr Mike I know you feel like doctors are improving and your honest belief in this is admirable. Sadly that is not the case. For 4yrs I begged for help from my GP and the local hospital for my hemeturia and severe abdominal pain. I was told it was either a nasty UTI or my being peri-menopausal. No diagnostic tests during that entire time. Turns out it was Stage 4 Ovarian Cancer. And the intern after my surgery tried to convince me that tylenol 3 days after surgery should be sufficient for my pain relief. It's happening and it isn't just 67 yr old white male doctors who are doing this .. it's your colleagues. Stop trying to find excuses. Doctors are unconscious bias. Things will only truly improve when you get the same treatment as the patients .. then you will actually care.
I would not be so nice honestly, you call it admirable - I would say naive.
I'm so sorry... how are you doing now..? Have you gone into remission??
yuh
@@smilemore1997 Feeling much better. Just one more scan on my 5th anniversary and then I will be declared cancer-free. But this experience has made me incredibly feisty and yes, angry. I did confront the GP who kept dismissing my concerns - told him I hope his daughter never has to have a doctor like him.
As for the Junior Doctor (Intern) luckily my surgeon set him straight. I got the pain relief I wanted. I did have to yell "come here and let me rip out your testicles and you tell me if regular tylenol is good enough".
I mean, you’re right, but it’s important to point out that not all doctors are like this, and while I’m so sorry for your bad experience, I think that what mike meant was that the number of doctors who are discriminatory is decreasing, whether it’s decreasing fast enough is a separate conversation though
When I was 16 in high school, I was riding on a bus to school when I felt like someone had stabbed me. I was coming back from my EMT classes and knew the pain was in my lower abdomen where my ovaries are. I was sitting on the bus crying it hurt so bad. I had to leave school because the slightest movement made it worse. I went to a doctor because I knew something was very wrong. My periods hurt horribly but I wasn't anywhere near when I would be having my period and they never had hurt this bad. He told me the pain I was experiencing was just cramping from my period and told me to just go home and lay on a heating pad.
Flash forward about a week and it hadn't gotten any better. I went to a GYN for my yearly and she sent me for scans. The ultrasounds showed I had several cysts on my ovaries. One was larger than my fist. I also found out I had endometriosis at another appointment about a year later. If it wasn't for my GYN I don't know how long I would have been walking around with those inside me.
Can I just clarify smthing, gyn is gynaecologist? I don't know where you live.... but that sounds like you have a really bad physician and u should change him. Every time I went to my doctor with some bigger problems she would send me to a specialist (depending on the symptoms). There are bad doctors everywhere. I live in a city of 2 million ppl and word travels fast, so when someone is doing their job not so good, people will just avoid that doctor.
I had the same thing happen to me and was treated horribly in the ER. I had to beg them to please figure out what was happening to me. A doctor read my CT scan wrong and said my cyst was only 2mm big. They sent me home with nothing, I could barely walk and they offered me no wheelchair. On Monday I went to my obgyn and she was in shock. She said they called her for lesser things. I ended up having a 10 cm dermoid cyst. The pain I waa feeling was my ovary dying. My friend who is a doctor suspected they thought I was drug seeking.
@@BNJ24 yeah. The ER doc was horrible. And they probably also thought I was drugged seeking. I refuse to go back to that hospital. Even after the doctor in question left.
I mean shit dude more than likely unless my nut is falling out of my sac, there's no way I'm getting anything other than a recommendation to see a specialist...learn how to use medicine, and stop making it anyone else's fault.
@@jer280 i was a highschool student who was told my pain was normal. I believed him because he was a doctor. The MD at the end of his name gave him power. So no. I didn't go to a specialist because I couldn't wait for an appointment. But by all means shame someone for the fact that they didn't argue with a doctor when they were in pain, scared, and looking for answers.
i'm... pretty sure "low-quality hospital" counts as a socioeconomic factor
It does...but it's a bit nuanced. Because someone who is not themselves in poverty, but lives in an impoverished community, would be going to the local hospital. So, even if you are the anomaly in your zipcode, you may be getting lower quality care. In rural areas, there may be good hospitals, but if they're an hour drive away, that can impact people's decision to bother going or delay whatever care they would eventually receive. Difficult to treat someone within 2 hours of stroke symptoms if they can't even get to the hospital within that window!
But really, there are some obvious zipcodes where one could test out whether it's a socio-economic issue or a racial issue. Prince Georges County, Maryland, just outside DC, is majority African American, and also at a decently high socio-economic status. So, the entire community, the taxes, and yes, the hospitals, are *not* low socio-economic status, and *not* majority white.
If any of these studies were done there, and found a disparity between average care afforded to patients there vs national averages....that would be quite significant. But all studies done in the social sciences know you have to take socio-economic status into account before claiming any statistically significant correlations. When someone does a study and says that the effects hold true regardless of socio-economic status...it means they looked at something to control for that. I think it's pretty clear that there are racial biases in medicine in the US, and while some of those biases are systemic (in training, in funding hospitals, on workload of doctors, etc), some of them are also likely connected to how individual doctors relate to individual patients.
'should'? No, of course not. What's being discussed in this video, and in John Oliver's original segment, is the reality of what care people *do* receive...and not based on what they can afford, either.
Men and women have different experiences with health care. Blacks and whites have different experiences with health care. And, to the shock of absolutely no one, wealthy and poor have different experiences with health care.
@nunya business Rand paid in full for his hernia surgery at the Shouldice Hernia Hospital.
Canada has quite a lot of private options, which constitute around 30% of their healthcare funding through private insurance and out-of-pocket payments, and those are very commonly used by foreigners due to better professionals or equipment in specific areas. very similar to what happens when people go to the US or Germany for specific treatments and/or surgeries.
But Doctors in the areas are probably great at GSWs.
I have read about this issue...basically, middle class black people are more likely to live in a high poverty community than middle class white people because of discrimination or choice. And therefore are more likely to have a low-quality hospital near them.
Except studies found that even between same socioeconomic classes, black patients are treated worse. Even wealthy black patients. Take Serena Williams for example. If her and her husband hadn't kept harping at the doctors that something was wrong, she would have hemmoraged to death. She almost died because doctors wouldn't listen to her despite having the highest level of care and being one of the richest black women in the US
Mind linking me any of those "studies"?
J41
This article lists a few.
Except:
In 2003, the Institute of Medicine released a landmark report on disparities in health care. The evidence for their existence was enormous. The research available at that time showed that even after controlling for socioeconomic factors, disparities remained.
www.nytimes.com/2019/02/25/upshot/doctors-and-racial-bias-still-a-long-way-to-go.html
EXACTLY!!!!
@@quint-major2763 This wasn't one of the pieces of evidence that John Oliver puts out though. Doctor was making an analysis of the evidence from that clip.
This doesn't outright proves bias. Relativity is wrong according to quantum mechanics, and the same the other way around. Does this mean that either one of the theories are wrong? No. It's just that depending on different scenarios, they wrong. I'm trying to say that there's no perfect study in the world, and no perfect person. Your study might be subject to bias and the same with doctor Mike's study. It doesn't mean any of them are wrong though. It just means we have to find the greater causation to why it is so.
This hits hard. I almost died from Pneumonia when I was 5 yrs old because my doctor refused to give me (female, POC) antibiotics. He turned my mother away 3 times before she said she wasn't leaving without antibiotics. When he finally did an X-ray after weeks of my suffering and being mostly unconscious at home, he saw my lungs were so full of fluid they could not make the gurgling sound that he was only checking for. Instead of recommending to put me in the hospital, he just gave her antibiotics and said to hope for the best since I was so far gone.
I get “walking pneumonia” it always take me getting very sick for a doctor other than my old pc to believe me. When you have it your lungs don’t make any odd sounds. They just fill up until you can’t breathe. Maybe it was like that :(
i'm sorry that happened to you and your mom. it's unforgiveable.
I was nearly misdiagnosed with “just” an ovarian cyst when I had a huge kidney stone (9mm. Twice the size of what a person can pass) completely blocking my ureter. And because of that I had a severe kidney infection.
The pain was indescribably bad. The only semi-coherent thought I had was wanting to get a hammer and knock myself unconscious. I was vomiting continuously and what little urine I could produce was mostly blood.
When I’m in extreme pain I get quiet and might cry quietly. My husband tried telling the doc “hey, see how she’s quiet and curled up in a ball? That’s BAD!”
Still the doc dismissed me. He said they couldn’t test my urging for an infection because I was on my period. I wasn’t on my period. He completely ignored my fever from the kidney infection. Once a CAT confirmed it was a kidney stone, the doc insisted the stone was small enough to pass easily. He said he knew it was small because he had seen “huge 300lb bikers on the floor screaming” because of kidney stones, so if I’m quiet it must be small.
I had that stone blocking my ureter and a double kidney infection for a month, and went to the ER four times (each time increasing the degree to which I was assumed to be drug-seeking) before they referred me to a urologist who had to do surgery to remove the stone.
On the bright side, my urologist was FURIOUS with the ER doc and the entire ER department. He went on a bit of a war path towards them.
Annie holy fuck that’s a story. I’m glad you made it through
What?? Sorry if my english is bad, i'll try my best to explain myself. I'm from argentina and currently going to medschool. Here we have a public healthcare sistem so anyone can get treatment. So for me it's a crazy thing what you are saying. I'm so sorry that this happened to you only because you are a women. And btw, you can NEVER confused an ovary cyst with a kidney stone, like NEVER. At least here, in public hospitals we have limited resorces but we find the way to treat our pacients and we learn how to do it even if we don't have all the things we need. So this is crazy to me: the people that justify the bad treatment because of the quality of the hospital. It's true that it makes it harder but you have to find a way to treat your pacients until the condition of the hospital gets better. Sorry again for that stupid doctor, he needs to open his mind and also get a good book of physiology
I am so sorry after reading what you went through. Hope you are okay now.
Did the doctor even order a sonography before confirming it to be an ovarian cyst if not it is negligence from the doctors side.
It is (or should be) well known that women have a higher tolerance for pain than men. May have partially caused your misdiagnosis, the disparity of opiate prescriptions, etc.
I'm happy you finally found the care you needed.
When we look at this topic it is helpful to remember no one will say “I treat women different because they are women” for the most part people who possess a bias are not typically aware of the bias.
I have first hand experienced this. I was diagnosed with C-Diff at the Mayo Clinic in Arizona. The doctor did not prescribe any medicine (later they cited communication issues internally), when I called repeatedly as my symptoms worsened, I was dismissed as hysterical. You rarely hear medical professionals referring to men as hysterical
Because that doctor does not care .
Hysterical is a medical reference from the early 1900's. You might wanna get a new doctor. Or an entire new hospital. 😐
Laura May They aren’t hysterical, THEY have anger issues
Yeah... it doesn’t quite make sense to say “there’s no hard evidence of bias” because you can’t get someone who’s biased to readily admit to it; that’s not how it works. You examine the correlation instead, and at a certain point the conclusion becomes pretty obvious.
My grandmother had hysterectomy in 1940s & her dr put her on life long refills of valium. She had no depression or mood swings, but her dr told her to get it filled every month and take whenever she felt "anxious". Grandma believed only men were good drs.
As a teenager, when I'd get upset about anything, Grandma would give me a valium to make me feel better! She's gone now or she'd be in trouble for dispensing valium to kids, but she always said, "The doctor knows best." ; )
I was admitted to the ER with severe agonizing abdominal pain. They did an MRI & ultrasound. I was scolded by the ultrasound tech for screaming out when she was digging into my ribcage to look at my gallbladder. She said I shouldn't even try to get pregnant if I can't handle the pain. It felt like she was trying to slice me open with a dull knife. They found I was badly constipated on top of needing to get my gallbladder checked. Fast forward 2 months later taking a lunch break at work, nothing out of the ordinary. Then out of nowhere my hands are tingling and numb, trouble breathing, chest pain, dizziness, etc. Was taken to the ER by ambulance, passed out somewhere along the way. I was completely (or at least felt) paralyzed. The nurses were yelling and screaming at me to stop faking it and to push myself up onto the bed. They used something to wake me up but still felt unable to move or speak. They then just put an IV in and left me half-way on the bed saying they didn't have time to be dealing with such a dramatic patient. They released me saying that it was just an anxiety attack even after I said it's never happened before. Lost my job for not showing up for work due to still feeling ill for several weeks. Got around to finally seeing a specialist that said I had a gallbladder infection. Got scheduled for removal and the surgeon said it was a miracle that it hadn't burst.
God I hope you sued everyone in that ER who 'treated' you.
Bastards!
PLEASE SUE ALL OF THEM! you were lucky, some might not be :/
That's awful omg
I sincerely hope you sued that ER. Holy smokes 😳
Smells to me like a lawsuit worth lots of hot cash. Remember people, if this happens to you, talk to a lawyer and sue them if you can.
Edit: the hospital I mean, don't sue your lawyer.
I find Dr. Mike to be a more caring and curious person than most doctors I have seen. That being said, I don’t think he understands the experience women have with most doctors.
I have a really great doctor now. I have had her notice things I didn’t, diagnose things I’ve had problems with for years and refer me to anyone she thinks can help when things look a little more specific than a family doctor can figure out. That being said, if I show up with my husband, she asks his opinion for medical care every time. She literally asked my husband if we should try a different medication instead of talking to me about it.
Also, could doctors stop asking me when my last period was? My answer is 2016!
I see this problem in a lot of industries, probably most if not all of them: A professional in that industry, who is a good person, has sound ethics about their practices, etc. will (unintentionally) universalize their experience. Dr. Mike's a good guy, and when he universalizes his experience, the extrapolation that presents itself is that "It can't be/isn't generally the doctors practicing, but some external factor." Similarly many therapists who are good people don't comprehend the prevalence of quack therapists who are shitheads.
Is your GP speaking to your husband instead of you?! Like not respecting him as your partner and asking if they have any questions but directing their interview and instructions to him as if you have an empty brain pan as a woman?! Arrrgghhh! Special level of hell for women marching for misogyny! 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥
I’m an optimistic person and I appreciate the desire to see things “from the optimistic side”, but I need to make the point that it’s easy to be optimistic when you can go to bed at night without the fear of discrimination and bias directly, and very negatively, impacting your health. There is no feeling of immediacy for the privileged class (of which I am a part). If it takes us a week, a month, a year, or even a decade more to solve these problem, yeah, we feel bad, but we don’t go without our knee replacement, or our heart attack treatment, or our crippling period pain brushed off as “hysteria”.
I think it’s incredibly important that we try to overcorrect on issues of gender, racial, and socioeconomic bias, and then dial back if needed. We aren’t doing enough.
Brien Elwood Washburn Well put! This is clearly a realization Dr. Mike hasn’t had yet. Hopefully he does soon.
Brien Elwood Washburn I agree with you. It does not feel like Dr. Mike has had the right experiences to tackle this topic, yet. We need to get more data or we need to understand what this study says is not the answer to those of us getting poor or bias care want to hear.
Travis Sweet I didn’t effectively say it, I explicitly said it. You know nothing of me or my upbringing so I have no idea what “evidence” you think you have to the contrary. Lastly, it didn’t help because your comment was essentially nonsense. How could that have possibly helped?
Wow, and this is the kind of accountability that minorities like me (latinx) want. When we say black lives matter and when we highlight the issues that affect are community we are not saying put aside yours or yours would be removed from the conversation. We are saying, hear us, let’s tackle the issue at hand so that I as a 23 year old woman I’m not scared of going to my first OBGYN appointment because I’ve been told that I’m being dramatic.
White people need to understand that in order for change to happen you must hold yourself accountable and understand your privilege and take advantage of it in a way that it helps us all creat a real tangible difference in the system that Doctors like Mike work at and abide by.
Thank you for so eloquently explaining the privilege that Mike and you share. When he said “in a 100 years” my first thought was “I kinda want to feel safe going to my doctor now” because I know I need it.
Anyways sorry I ramble. I just thought that as a white man, the way you acknowledge your privilege can serve as an example of what social movements regarding gender and racial equality NEED from the “majority” population. Being an ally is not just going to protest and signing petitions, it’s about holding yourself accountable, using your privilege and educate other to do the same with their own.
Thank you for saying this. I kept feeling like I love all the points he's making, but ultimately what the conclusion is "things will change, but for now, we're all f'kd "
Admire the long term optimism but this picture needs to be seen Now.
“That’s all the patient can afford” should never ever be a consideration in treating a human being.
Yes but is that bad on the part of the medical practitioner or the system? The doctor would rather give you some pain meds than none. But if you talk to most doctors, they would agree that the insurance system make patient outcomes worse for this exact reason.
Yep. Welcome to America, where we care about money, not people. Thank the Republicans for keeping us here, and thank the Dems for being too useless to do anything about it
I just wish Americans could feel and understand how wrong such statement is to us, people from all of other developed countries.. 🤦🏻♀️
Seems like a universal health insurance could put everyone at the same starting point. No insurance bias. 😌
I agree, thats why I left the US. Only place in the developed world where people will die because they can't afford treatment. The US doesnt treat the people there as citizens, they're customers and if they cant pay, they don't matter
In 2010, my ex-husband violently attacked me, causing me to end up in urgent care for a massively swollen, bright red leg that hurt to be touched. I tried explaining to the doctor that I have a very high tolerance for pain and with that much pain it had to be something serious. He diagnosed me with a sprain. The physical therapist all but called me a cry baby because he did not think a sprain should hurt as much as I was claiming and kept trying to force me to walk. A month after the injury, they finally did a CAT scan. My femur had a spiral fracture almost the length of it, and my rectus femoris, patella tendon, ACL, PCL, sartorius, and plantaris were torn. (My patella tendon was severed, technically.) My patella and fibula were fractured, my meniscus was irreparably torn, and there was extensive nerve and vascular damage. Sure the three fractures were hairline spiral fractures, but they were visible on the original Xrays: They were just ignored. They also did not Xray my head until after the CAT scan. I had hairline fractures at the base of my skull that had begun to heal. The strongest medication I took was Motrin 800, and the pain was horrific. I now live in constant pain and rely on a cane or a wheelchair to get around. The physical therapist at least apologized for his treatment of me
Yikes. If you are an American, I hope you sued.
@@r2.b2 I wish I had, but I was so preoccupied with getting away from my ex and keeping our children and his great-grandpa who lived with us safe that I really did not think about it at the time. All the events surrounding that time period are insane. The night he shattered my leg and I called the police, the officer half carried me to my ex's car so I could drive HIM to the hospital to have a psych evaluation. They left me with him. That is just a bit of it!
@Fluffy _MrSheep I wish it were false. You do not have to believe me, but the fact is, despite all their training, doctors and therapists make mistakes and are sometimes extremely negligent. They also cannot fix everything. That is why, like me, people end up with permanent disabilities from accidents and injuries. In my case, they may not have originally taken me seriously because my now-ex-husband literally carried me into the Urgent Care and told them I had fallen in the stairs and was too stubborn to come before then. Of course, the doctors are not going to admit that they were negligent because they do not want to be sued. My case is far from the worse: I am, thankfully, still alive. According to a Johns Hopkins study, there are more than 250,000 deaths per year related to some form of medical malpractice or neglect.
One of my biggest issues, when I have gone to or taken someone to the ER or Urgent Care, is that they ask "Do you feel safe at home?" with other people in the room. Had they asked me while I was alone, I could have told them the truth.
Doctors are not gods. They are not infallible. Some are too arrogant to listen to their patients. Some just make mistakes.
You could probably still sue them. US has like, 10 years delay before a case is closed. And if you still got injured from malpractice, it's basically a solid evidence.
@Teapot Inc Except if it were me I would have demanded an X-ray or gone somewhere else. This is what makes it seem false so either it's not real or she really needs to learn how to take control of a serious problem. It's 2 sides of a coin. You have the idiots who come in with what is probably viral and demand antibiotics and need to go to hell and the people who sit there and accept a diagnosis that seems pretty wrong when they haven't done a thorough enough amount of testing.
It's not just women and people of color who this affects too. It happens to members of the LGBTQ community as well, especially at the Christian Hospitals. My husband was supposed to be admitted for two days to avoid complications that could happen with moving too suddenly. The same day he went in after the doctor left the nurse generated discharge paperwork and told him, "You need to leave because you need to give up your room to someone that isn't like you." Horrible that this happens at all. It's sick, no pun intended.
Religious hospitals should be illegal
I switched doctor about a year ago after moving to a new apartment - and when I came in for the first time for a check-up, after he familiarized himself with my files, one of the first things he did, was ask about my "intentions" as a transgender woman on HRT, and whether I intended "downstairs" surgery, then proceeded to tell me a horror story that "he had heard" about an unnamed trans person in England, who'd had that kind of surgery and suffered complications.
No preamble, didn't pay attention to the fact, that I outright stated that I was undecided on the subject of that particular surgery as of yet, didn't even matter that he had NOTHING to do with that surgery at all, as that whole process is handled by a separate department that specializes in this sort of thing - just straight into the scary horror story about that one trans person one time that had a bad result after surgery...
I don't want to judge him too harshly, as he's a small-town doctor, who likely has never even met a trans person before, but it's not exactly an encouraging start...
I watched my mom have her first heart attack at the breakfast table when I was 9. She thought it was a gallbladder attack as she was getting close to her surgery date to remove the gallbladder.
She eventually went to the hospital a few hours later. It took the doctors 4 hours to diagnose the heart attack. Finally they did a cardiac enzyme test and it showed her levels were sky high. Only then did they act and treat her. She was in ICU and in the hospital for 2 weeks.
16 years later her heart stopped at work and she fell over dead. Thankfully her co-workers knew cpr and the paramedics came quicky. She was shocked five times and we were told to expect the worst. She amazingly pulled through. This time with a pace/defib implant.
6 years after that her defib went off at home. By the time she got to the hospital it went off 20 more times. They sedated her. It went off 90 times total, draining the battery. She was also externally shocked a few times. Again we were told to prepare for the worst. Again she pulled through although not unscathed. Her quality of life wasn't as good and she went downhill quickly. 10 months later she was back in the hospital and we had to remove life support.
I sometimes wonder if she had quicker care with the first attack if she might have lived longer and avoided some of the trouble she had. I'll never know.. but it does bother me that she was 4 hours before they even ran cardiac enzymes.
Kathy S they did that with my husband as well..because he was ‘too young’ to have a heart attack and it “definitely wasn’t a heart attack.” When the next shift of drs came on they did the test and as soon as they could rushed him to a different hospital to get a cardiac cath and 2 stints put in. Almost had to have open heart surgery but the dr really didn’t want to do that to my husband since he was so young and kept pushing until he made it work. Took a lot longer than usual and fun tidbit told to me(his wife) by the dr is that one of the clots was in the area they called the “widow maker.” Thanks doc.
Also a woman here, doctors also told me "It's just in my head"
Guess what? After 19 years it's now clear that I have a GENETIC disorder called EDS, and all that time without diagnosis caused a lot of damage.
Still, doctors don't know this disorder which causes 20 to 40 luxations every day, so I still get to hear "It's all in my head"
So. Yeah. Trust is somewhat gone
Jam Feeling for you. I also have EDS and have had some horrific experiences trying to get care. It’s sad that I’m one of the lucky ones in that my diagnosis came in 6 years... only 6 years. Ugh.
It's even worse if you have a psychological issue (either diagnosed or undiagnosed), which do cause physical symptoms due to the condition or the medication. I came to my doctor with shaking hands once, and she refused to believe it was a side effect of my new depression meds (I later learned it was a common symptom of that medication and had a high risk of becoming PERMANENT). She concluded my 19 year old self must have early onset Parkinson's disease (which is EXTREMELY RARE for that age group). My family and I nearly had a heart attack!
I watch a channel called Simon and Martina, they're a Canadian couple who live in Japan and make UA-cam videos. Every once in a while, Martina will talk about her struggle with EDS, the pain she goes through daily, and her difficulties finding emergency care that takes her seriously. Usually she tries to hide it, but every once in a while, she'll come on camera with a cane or an immobilizer, and I can't even begin to imagine what it's like to live with EDS. I highly recommend their channel, it's become like a small EDS community 😊
I would like to see the doc who tried that on me. It's in your head. Sure.
YOU HAVE EDS AND THE DOCTORS TOLD YOU IT WAS ALL IN YOUR HEAD!? *_CHRIST_*
I have a friend with EDS, he's TWENTY TWO and walks with a CANE. It might be a different type of EDS, but I know that even with the diagnosis his life is tough. Sorry you had to go through that for nineteen whole years.
Two stories: my bestie was told for damn near a year that the pain was in her head. Turns out that her ovary had ruptured and started rotting (def not the correct medical term) in her body.
My mother was also told for more then a year that she was crazy and the pain was in her head. They performed a hysterectomy. Turns out she had stage 4 colon cancer.
Why is it that women are so often told the pain is in our head?:(
Nancy Hernandez To be fair though I was told the same thing for 5+ years only recently because I kept going back I was given an MRI and found out that my L3 and 4 discs no longer exist. Guys run into this problem too because of the opioid epidemic.
Brandon Drayton I’m definitely don’t think men are immune from bad medical treatment. I just truly think their is a gender disparity.
Nancy Hernandez I agree with you. Men are not immune to bad medical treatment, but I think women do experience it more.
Which is absolutely an issue that needs to be addressed, whether the cause be medical bias or not
As a woman I constantly go through the issue of being mistreated and brushed off by my doctors. Even other women in the medical profession will do it because this is what they are literally trained to do. I have been told to my face that "women are more hysterical and have less control over their emotions and therefor I am sending you home." I have informed them that I was also a nurse for a period of time, and come from a family chock full of medical professionals.. I am laughed at. I have almost died because of this, and have developed cancer that has spread from my ovaries to my stomach as a result. Medical malpractice lawyers are no better as I have been told, "We can't take your case because women are statistically more likely to lose a court case of this nature over men." I no longer even go to general appointments, or Urgent Care facilities unless a family member guilts me into it over a pretty prolonged period of time. I have come to the point where I feel that I'd much rather just die at home than in a waiting room somewhere waiting for care that will never come.
When speaking of maternal mortality rates, JO said the us has the highest rates of any developed country. Your counter argument was that here probably not any higher than they were several years ago. That's not the point. At all. That's just saying that the rates have always been higher than in other developed countries.
I don't think he was trying to countermand the point, he was explaining why there was a supposed sudden rise...
That stood out to me too. Classic strawmanning
+
Why are people obsessed with comparing it to "other developed countries"? I mean, what's with that constant comparison? This is all negative criticism from John Oliver and only positive reactions from Mike. It's not enough to ridicule the healthcare system into correcting its mistakes. It won't work. Ever. We must all do what Mike is trying to do - find specific actionable goals - not rant about the injustice in the system. I mean, what can you do about the personal bias that arises purely from unfounded prejudices? Fire all those doctors? Does it help the healthcare system overall? No! It would set us a decade or two back. But what we CAN do is identify the factors that affect personal biases like socioeconomic factors that Mike mentioned and work to decrease them.
Ashley Wooten there are still people using dialup or people that don’t have access to internet
Wow for doctor mike to review this controversial topic is honestly amazing. Thank you for breaking this down 🙏
I cannot EVEN START to count how many times a doctor (m or f) said that it’s probably a period pain when I had a gut issue, or vice versa. It’s a different sensation for gods sake! I lived in this body for over 20 years, maybe, just maybe, I can distinguish a diarrhea cramps from cramps in my uterus?!
It's sad how our concerns as women get downplayed.
yep! severe abdominal cramping. went to the school nurse and was told it was most likely female problems. Well an hour later I had a fever over 100 degrees and was vomiting into the trash in the math room. But it was "just my period"
@@pokeyj123 I went to my campus's healthcare center when I was in college because I was extremely sick--coughing, sneezing, fever, sore throat, chills, aches... The nurse insisted I must be pregnant. (I was a virgin.)
The hospital told me 4 times that the pain that had me doubled over was heartburn, even when I told them my urine was brown. Went to a different hospital the 5th time to have a gall stone removed, then the entire thing 2 days later when the bilirubin went down. The doctor said I had about 2 days before I died if I hadn't come in.
well dont you think she probably gets a lot of cases of young girls with abdo pain who just have cramps? In medicine, you go to the most common causes first
The doc I had been seeing retired and I was "shopping" for a new one. My scheduled visits usually lasted 3-5 mins with the doc telling me "workout more and you'll feel better". I finally made an appt at a clinic that required blood work for all new patients. My first visit was typical, but my follow-up (after the blood work came back) gave me faith in medical science again. The doc actually apologized - I was hypoglycemic (not diabetic) with low blood pressure (not high), low blood cell count, and signs of auto-immune disorders. Had the clinic not mandated blood work - and had the doc not been willing to accept they were wrong - I wouldn't have gotten the treatment I needed. It took 14 tries to find someone who looked past my gender and waist-line to really find out what was wrong. If I wasn't a stubborn goat, I'd still be passing out from low sugar/pressure issues on a daily basis.
I wish more doctors would be open to considering the problems in their field like you are. I've nearly died from a neurosurgeon not listening to me. I walked into my surgery & I left my chiari malformation decompression unable to walk & with crippling pain worse than when I went in. At the follow up he said I was 'cured' & needed to see someone else because he had already 'done his job'. I was sent to a neurologist who said I had migraines & just needed botox! I was literally dying & I knew it. I was deteriorating fast.
I obsessivly researched my condition & found there were only a handful of actual chiari specialists in America, the neurosurgeon who did my surgery had lied to me & was not a specialist for chiari at all. I went the night I found the closest specialist 4hrs away to the ER he was affiliated with & was given a referral. He had me in surgery 2 weeks later. The first surgeon left me 100% CSF blocked! I've been diagnosed with IIH, Syringomyellia (sp?) & 3 types of neuralgia since then.
That's the difference in a good medical professional & one who should not be practicing anymore. It took me 9 YEARS of being symptomatic & going to doc after doc to even be seen by a specialist! They even seen the Chiari on an MRI the first year I was symptomatic & said it was "too small". My neurosurgeon is absolutely convinced my condition is as bad it is now where I have multiple chronically painful conditions & became entirely disabled as a direct result of delayed diagnosis & treatment.
My life is forever changed, my career as a FF/EMT was taken, my kids lives changed forever, because they didn't care. I share my story when I can in hopes anyone in the healthcare field will listen. I talk to professionals in my area often & recommend to anyone with similar stories speak up. Nothing will change unless we bring the change. I fear the ER because of the poor care I've been given, i don't want that for future patients. We all deserve better.
Natosha Nichole please tell me you sued, that doctor deserves a jail sentence and his license taken away
He was so defensive about the medical community on this video... gzes man, listen um dr Mike!
@@Redditok111 no one would take him on. I do a lot of volunteer speaking events, including at the hospital he works at though.
Natosha Nichole I just go to doctor after doctor until I find one who gives me the solution I need. When I had pneumonia I had to go to three different ones but eventually one helped me. I just hope e day I don’t die before I find the right one from whatever condition I have.
Natosha Nichole i feel u, because of my previous doctor before i had my current one, never told me pre D and cuz of that i am type 2 my life and world changed forever, im only 18
A doctor in the ER tried to diagnose my 15 yr old sister as being 'sensitive' for falling over & screaming in agony during a soccer game. No one hit her or touched her & she fell over screaming. My mom had to demand an xray.
Diagnosis.....CANCER!
There was a mass in her femur. She started chemotherapy days later & had to get part of her femur removed (had an implanted joint put in for her knee)
Yeah...we weren't impressed. My sister is now fine btw. It's 20 years later and she's good.
I know so many women who were brushed off by doctors and told 'don't get emotional' or they're 'sensitive' or just plain made to feel stupid for having concerns.
One of my friends almost died because each ER visit she was told she had the flu. When she finally could get in to see he GP her symptoms were gone. When they returned she went to the ER several times before she passed out and nearly died. She was bleeding internally! Turns out her colon was paper thing & about to rupture. They did surgery that night, having to remove part of her colon. She was 21 and from then on she had to use a colostomy bag. All because the doctors didn't listen & didn't want to run tests.
I have a dozen other cases where my friends (or even myself) were completely ignored, saying it was either an 'emotional' issue or 'weight' issue when in fact people have had real issues that needed attention. It's made me skeptical. And while this isn't a research paper & I have no statistics, I have talked about this with male friends & relatives. None of them have ever been brushed off or made to feel stupid. They've always said "oh no they're always told 'better safe than sorry". Meanwhile I was with a friend once who was having a lot of pain & the ER doc said 'don't come in unless it's actually important'...making her feel stupid. Despite her existing condition....
I really do hope doctors get better. I know there are a lot of good doctors out there but that doesn't always help with the system being what it is. Right now my doctor only gives us 10 minutes.
He comes in, reads over my chart (during my appointment time) then asks me questions in 5 minutes. Touches my neck, listens to my heart & breathing then that's it. I asked him once about whether I should go on meds for anxiety disorders as they sometimes are horrible & sometimes not bad. Then he said 'you should have told me you were going to need to talk about this. Next time we'll book 20 minutes' He told me to make an appointment so we can talk about that particular issue. So the receptionist checked and the only opening was in 3 months. Great...
Starbits7 those stories are horrible 😞
In the defense of the doctor for your sister, cancer, especially highly progressed, is rare in young patients. Their cells are generally better at self repair than older people, and any random mutations that occur in pluripotent cells don't add up as much as the number of mutations in older patients.
It's hard to check for every possible ailment.
Where in the world are you? That health care sounds horrible, especially the 5min doctor appointment, here in Australia a typical doctor appointment is 30mins and free, you have plenty of time to speak about what ever you want.
@@trybunt While still "free" (taxes) in Denmark, we still have the same issue some places. I have to tell the secretary what I'll need to talk about, so she can book a long enough appointment. I've had a doctor get mad/snapping at me due to this too. I mean, I generally don't feel like sharing my personal ailments on the phone.
Especially considering I have to call during work hours, since the phone is only open 9-12:30 Monday - Thursday, and 9-12.00 on Fridays.
Also, my doctor has no other way of booking appointments.
These issues are quite minor, but still indicates that they are overworked, and need more resources.
@@MartinFinnerup ah, yes, obviously we pay taxes, and emergency room wait times are probably the most painful things over here in Australia. Its not perfect, but if you have a heart attack, like my father in law just a couple months ago, you can have a week in hospital with 2 operations free of charge. My cousins wife has diabetes, and the insulin is basically free. I had a collapsed lung when I was younger, with 3 seperate operations over a 2 week hospital stay, all free. My brother had a twisted stomach, he lost 90% of his intestines in emergency surgery, spent weeks in hospital fighting for his life, and now lives without a colostomy bag thanks the amazing doctors.
What I'm trying to say is that I'm more than happy to pay taxes for free healthcare for anyone that needs it, it should be a human right to be taken care of when sick, and while the system can be frustrating sometimes, me and half the people I love owe our lives to modern healthcare, 200 years ago we'd all be dead.
Keep this in your mind: Just for the fact that someone has a medical degree doesn't necessarily make them a good person.
Okay, duly noted. That said, I would like to add that the inverse is also just as true.
@@cogitoergosum9069 I feel "not necessarily a bad person" is a low bar for healthcare professionals...
@@EdwardLindon By inverse I meant "that being a 'good' person doesn't necessarily make them have a medical degree"
@@dqarqeer8603 I admit that I could have maybe made my point a bit more clear. What I meant to point out was that there was no point in the original comment by pointing out that the inverse was just as true. I wasn't trying to be mean.
In response to someone saying that having a degree doesn't make a good person. I pointed out that being a good person doesn't necessarily give you a degree (read: expertise in the medical field).
Why do you think what I said was dumb?
Edit: typo
Same goes for education degrees trust me
What I find interesting is that several years later people are still posting comments about their experiences being mistreated by medical staff. And many are calling out some of the points that he brings up. I have no doubt that Dr. Mike is a wonderful doctor and so are his colleagues but there have been many times throughout this video where it feels like he almost dismisses claims because he has not seem them. He is trying his best. But often it feels like he makes excuses. I don't think he's aware of how often some things like bias can actually lead to "egregious medical mistakes". Far more often than he is willing to admit.
My thoughts exactly. He always says he doesn't treat lab results, he treats people. He should look at statistics the same way. Not everything might be shown in statistics cause the research method also can be biased (which he even calls out in this video). There are numerous of people sharing their experience that should not be ignored. This comment section alone is showing that racial and gender bias is very real and it leads to a lot of cases of medical negligence. Human lives can't be seen as numbers in statistic reports. And this problem isn't only in the States. I live in Poland and it is illegal for a woman to get her tubes tied and so is abortion. The gender bias is literally written in the law. Also you just can't say "men and women experience heart attack differently" and "women's symptoms are atypical" in one video because that alone shows a huge gender bias. Our different symptoms aren't atypical. They're typical to our gender and they should not be looked at though men's symptoms glasses.
Nice comment, however he is not dismissing anything. He addresses your point at around 22:00. The bias clearly happens but as an evidence-based physician and a medical scientist the WHY is what is most important to him and it should be to everyone. Sometimes understanding the WHY leads to discovering other factors beyond the difference in race.
@@CyriacS According to your profile picture, you're a white man. Ever consider the fact that while you and Dr. Mike, two WHITE men, do not feel that " he is not dismissing anything", women and people of color feel that he IS being dismissive? Quite interesting how 99% of the comments accusing him of being dismissive are from women and people of color, while it's only WHITE MEN arguing that he IS NOT being dismissive? You should stop mansplaining. The victims are women and people of color, and if several of us who watch this video get a very bad feeling at some of the statements made by Dr Mike, maybe you should consider our opinions instead of just dismissing us?
@@CyriacS he absolutely IS dismissing it. See 11:53 forwards; he says "I don't want to poison the doctor patient relationship with thinking that this is the norm. This is not the norm."
But it IS the norm, for many of us, including me. Six months of intermittent stabbing, burning abdominal pain every day before I got a diagnosis. Three months with a broken bone in my leg before I got a diagnosis. And the only pain medication I've ever gone home with a prescription for was when I got my wisdom teeth out which was NOTHING compared to the broken bone or the abdominal pain so I didn't even bother taking it. And it's not like I wasn't going to doctors, or I had one bad doctor - I went to several different doctors for both of those problems. ER for both, primary care provider for both, various specialists for both.
@@CyriacShe absolutely is dismissing.
Dr mike, you should cover one of John Oliver’s other medical story. Marketing to doctors.
Agree!
True. We either over prescribed, under prescribed or (what you're referring) prescribe from biased views because of being marketed to or even paid. Which I believe even impacts the subconscious. It's been brought to the forefront of their mind, so of course you'd think of it faster. I think if we were all taught a little more psychology we could avoid so many mistakes. Therapy should be akin to your teeth, you get them checked out every 6 months and cleaned up. 🦷✨ :b
@@bjasmine - yes, and WHY he won't cover that one!
@@theflowerhead personally I think cognitive bias is humanities greatest flaw, and it needs to be addressed in schools to avoid so many problems that occur when people don't realise they are being bias
It may hit too close to home....
Dr. Mike I highly encourage the next dive into healthcare be about Insurance Discount Premiums. That's the negotiation price on the hospital bill. How a 45k surgery bill only costs the insurance company at most 4500.
i had an internship in a hospital accountancy and i saw the cases where the hospital and insurance companies fought over what the hospital will get paid. and most of the time the sums were not just 4,5k also they werent about the whole payment only about what they fought about what gets paid. also i realized how many forms doctors in the ER had to fill out after seeing the patient that were about accounting. hospitals cut their staff to maintain profit or just being able to run without going bankrupt and then the little staff thats left is getting loaded with forms to fill out that take acutally longer then they see the patient. BUT i am from germany (pardon my english) so maybe its completely different, thats why i am interested in how you know the price difference.
@@avalla389 I have a degree in healthcare management. I did a literature review of hospital billing and payment. Along with personal experience I found the negotiated reimbursement rate that insurance companies hold on hospitals to be a true problems. The "hey we will only pay 8.5% of what you're asking or we will not include your hospital in our approved to get paid list."
I would love that too. I want more serious topics like this.
@Rizwan Hameed you pay for it through taxes right?
@@rajinparanoia 8,5 are sounds insane. i dont know enough about the american healthcare system to give any real input. and i really think that is something to be discussed again and again until its changed.
My mom was misdiagnosed when she was having a stroke. They thought she was a pain pill seeker and misdiagnosed her with having a migraine. Even though she said her left arm was numb, she could barely see, and was literally crying in pure agony. (Which she has never done.) Three days later they realized she had a stroke and she has permanent sightloss loss in her left eye and memory problems.
I wanted rip into the doctor who misdiagnosed her. Sad part is I told mom before going that I think she was having a stroke. The reason being I tested this theory, that my health teacher explained.
Told her to smile at me (her left half her face was not working), asked her to lift her arms (left arm was not able to stay up), and asked her tell me her phone number and grandma's name. (She could barely speak.)
It kills me with the amount of biased that exist. It kills me that I, who was 18-years-old in high school at the time, was able to see that my mom was having stroke when a doctor couldn't! It made me furious!
She's better now, but biases like that can cause people to suffer and possibly even die.
I suffered horrible period cramps and abdominal pain for several months. I also vomited constantly and my doctor kept dismissing it. (He tried giving me meds for nausea but they didn't work.) (This was a small free clinic since I have no health insurance, they couldn't really run tests to diagnose me.) I ended up going to the E.R. one night cause I fell to floor and vomited due to how much pain I was in. This happened while I was at work.
I had a coworker drive me to the E.R., I was crying in pain. They ran some tests only to find out that I have PCOS. I was like, REALLY!? Now they believe me!? Could we have solved this sooner!?
Not hating on doctors but it makes me mad. It also upsets me that we don't teach women about female reproductive issues like PCOS, Endometriosis, etc
I know many friends who suffer from reproductive issues that could have been treated sooner if they had not been ignored. It gets old.
"I also vomited constantly and my doctor kept dismissing it."
That's the point when you immediately (!) visit another, actually competent doctor.
@Knock Out I don't really hate them, it's just some of them obviously have a biased or assume I'm an idiot.
One time I had a metal shelf on a cart slam down on head because the latch that is supposed to hold it up was missing. I ended up going to the hospital that night because I had a concussion. The next day I had to be cleared by another doctor to go back to work. He proceeded to warn me about taking ibuprofen since there is a chance that if I have a brain bleed (no matter how small it is) I could make it worse since Ibuprofen acts as a sort if blood thinner.
He starts off his next sentence with: "You see a concussion is when..."
I cut him off and say: "The brain hits the skull, which results in a brain injury. It can result in things like memory loss, light sensitivity, sound sensitivity, etc. It can cause serious brain damage. I know."
He gave me a stunned look for like 2-5 seconds before asking if I have had a concussion before.
I then have to explain that, this is the first and hopefully only concussion I've ever suffered from. I then explained I know about concussions because health teacher used to be a football coach and explained to us several years ago why concussions are so serious.
Tbh, I wasn't exactly mad at him. The doctor had valid concerns and was very polite. I was just irritated because of light and sound sensitivity. I just wanted to go home and lay in a dark, quiet, room. Plus it happened during summer when it's extremely sunny about 2 years ago.
@@RooMoritz Well, when you don't have health insurance you're kind of f*cked when you have to go to a free clinic. He did try giving me several nausea meds but it did nothing. State says I make too much to have health insurance through them, and my current job's health insurance is a complete and utter joke.
@@flyingpastakitty My bad then... im used to the german system where nearly everyone has a health insurance.
@@RooMoritz In the U.S. health insurance is a joke. If you have certain medical conditions or medical issues certain health insurance companies won't cover it. My employer's health insurance does not cover any asthma medications. Inhalers can be around $80-$100. My friend who works at meijer has PCOS like I do and they won't cover her birth control. I know several type 1 diabetics who work at various places and their insulin can be a couple hundred dollars even with their insurance.
It's pretty sad. If you have a serious medical condition you could into debt, lose everything, or even die because of our "health insurance" or lack there of not covering your basic medical needs .
Many would argue that there are free clinics and programs to help with these things but they are hard to come by, and it seems like our government doesn't want us to have any form of free clinic. (Not attempting to get political, certain political parties hate free clinics.)
I know this is an old video. But there is a very important point I need to make to you Dr. Mike if you see this comment. As far as the lower quality hospitals leading to lower quality of care. Even if it isn't discrimination in the hospital itself. The fact that minorities are treated at lower quality hospitals, will almost always circle back to discrimination. Usually from systemic issues like the lasting effects of redlining policy and denial of FHA loans, and denying black vets access to the G.I. bill post WWII. This disparity which allowed whites to have more upward economic mobility, meant that their immediate children and grandchildren live in areas with more money and better hospitals. So even if discrimination isn't happening in the hospitals themselves. Which as an Afro-latina women in America I find unlikely. It still will almost always circle back to discrimination.
Thing is the gender bias isn't just an American problem. My taid (grandfather) was a obgyn in the NHS from the 60's-90's, and he frequently tells a story of a time he went down to the A&E at his hospital, and while he was down there he happened to walk past a woman with acute stomach pain. he asked her attending what was going on, and he told him they couldn't work it out, seeing as it wasn't her appendix, it wasn't her stomach, wasn't an injury ect. When they got to the end of all the things it wasn't and my taid realised he hadn't listed any possible reproductive issues he told him to do an ultrasound on her, and lo and behold she had ovarian torsion. It's scary to think that woman hadn't had an obgyn walk past the foot of her bed, that probably would have been ignored until it was far too late, and that she would have died.
Everytime the heart attack topic in females comes up, I remember one of my favorite scenes in Grey's Anatomy that Dr. Bailey goes to a hospital thinking she is having a heart attack and the male doctor continually dismisses her but then it turns out she was having one. Such a depressingly realistic portrayal of that scene
With all sarcasm, Grey's Anatomy is acting. If a woman presents with abdominal, chest, jaw, or thoracic back pain, they will be given an EKG, a troponin test, and chest x-ray. It's not the doctor's call, it's the policy of the hospital.
Erin Maurer I’ve been to the hospital presenting with abdominal pain on a couple occasions as has my mother. I got an EKG but none of the other tests. I got blood tests and an ultrasound but not other tests. Still not diagnosed btw. My mother had to return to the hospital on many occasions before they checked her chest when before they just gave her meds and sent her away
@@emilythompson7279 an EKG can tell them if you're in potential arrest. It's the first test they do. Once the EKG is read, an MI is either confirmed or ruled out. There are also physiological changes that we look for; gray pallor, sluggish capillary refill, or heart and lung sounds that don't sound right. Abdominal pain can be a lot of things and they start with the most important and move on from there: heart, lungs, gall bladder, liver, kidney infection, UTI's. All of them can present with abdominal pain. It's only been in the last 20 odd years that heart attacks in women have been really taken seriously. However, a scene from Grey's Anatomy still isn't an accurate portrayal of the medical field and never will be.
Erin Maurer fair, and I don’t think any medical show is a good representation, but I hope you realize that the issues are still present. In my case they didn’t listen to my lungs or heart and did nothing but the ekg and blood tests before sending me home telling me someone would call me for an ultrasound at a later date. My mother was told she was fine without any tests being done and was told that because she was on her period it was simply cramps which it wasn’t and she faced many surgeries after finally being taken seriously. It’s not only about heart attacks but medical issues in general. Just wanted to let you know it is totally up to the doctor to do proper testing. And that is only one of the many issues with the hospital system and having come back from the hospital about 2 days ago I can tell you that many things, such as the proper passing along of information when a patient is hardly conscious, is badly handled.
@@emilythompson7279 Of course I know that bias is present. I left the medical profession because of it. It's not just present in the medical facility, it's present in health insurance companies who refuse to pay for the tests that are needed.
Hi Dr. Mike! I'd love to discuss this subject matter with you. I'm a woman of color and have experienced bias first hand. As an example: I was told by an old white, male doctor that my abdominal pain was menstrual cramps. Turned out my gallbladder was so inflamed I needed emergency surgery. I spent a week in the hospital for that. When I my kidney grew a tumor the size of a lemon, I was told it was a UTI. I spent 6 weeks in the hospital for that. In both cases, I had to advocate for myself for more testing. It wasn't just the doctors: the triage team tried to send me home in both cases. I'd probably be dead by now if I didn't push for more testing. Please reach out. I'd love to share my stories with you
Ugh of course he ignored you. Thanks for sharing though.
@@lfior There’s no sign of him anywhere in this comment section, no pinned responses or replies, so it’s definitely plausible he just didn’t see it
I'm a white female and have had similar experiences. Women with endo often get that treatment, even us whites.
@murderoustendencies so true. My best friend has to deal with that and she's white passing.
I can’t even imagine being in that intersection of black and a woman. I am a woman and get treated like my pain isn’t real. Had a serious and life threatening illness that I had to diagnose and take to the doctor in order to finally get real help. I just don’t understand how any doctor could ever tell anyone “your experience of your own pain is wrong”. It’s mind boggling.
I would love to see you address this again with guests.
As a 69 year old Black cardiologist, I would love to see this addressed again with the benefit of additional perspectives.
Keep doing what you do. I love the variety of subjects covered in your videos.
I hope John Oliver decides to have a sit down with you. Would be interesting!
YES
Agree, wouldn't fit his narrative though
@@justinsullivan5839 I don't know who I "trust" more on this topic. Mike's counter arguments seem to show how John Oliver uses good sources which sadly enough are either dated or not well represented. Still, I like both John Oliver's show and Mike's YT channel. However, imo John Oliver could be a little bit more nuanced once in a while.
I appreciate as a health care provider hearing the more nuisanced approach. John Oliver is about shock value and getting people emotionally involved. Dr Mike is talking about the realities of medical care in the USA and how to improve. I do think the media over simplifies information and thus miss the important points. Improvement is the key I think we can all agree. When you have only 5 minutes per patient as opposed to 10, mistakes can happen. It is incredibly sad to see people not getting quality care. Let's fix the problem!
John's show is more to have people like Mike to have conversations about these issues.
When I was a teenager, I finally got braces but we knew from the jump that I was going to need jaw surgery because I had a very severe under-bite that couldn't be corrected with orthodontics alone. In preparation for the surgery my teeth had to be aligned and I had to have rubber bands and this metal bar across the roof of my mouth that ran across the sides of my inner upper jaw so that the top of my jaw could be widened. I'd turn this key and it would separate the two halves of my upper jaw little by little over time. It caused so much pain and swelling--I even cried. I'm a woman that's had major surgery before and practically lived at a hospital when younger. I usually have a high pain tolerance, and it felt like that bar was cutting into my gums. My gums got inflamed, and when I told my orthodontist that it hurt, he told me that I needed to floss more and it was inflamed because I wasn't brushing enough. I went to my dentist and when she saw my mouth she was horrified. She had never seen swelling so severe and the metal had actually cut into my gums so much so that they had swelled around the metal, practically disappearing into my gums. She gave me shots to lower the swelling and gave my mom a note to give to my orthodontist. I don't know what it said, but he immediately took the bar out, and when he did, I bled profusely. He tried to shield the bar from me, but I saw: the metal meant to be strong enough to widen a jaw had bent due to the severity of the swelling.
I was pissed to say the least. A year later I got the surgery, and guess what my maxillofacial surgeon told me? He needed to narrow the top jaw because it had been widened too much. He was a fantastic doctor, he did everything right, he had a weird bedside manner but I trusted him, because he never discounted me when I told him something hurt. I got a sinus infection shortly after the surgery and though common with this surgery, it could be deadly, and when I told him it hurt and there was pressure and it felt different than after surgery pain, he took it seriously. He explained to me what was likely going on, and provided clear instructions so that if it got worse, there was a way forward. I felt like I had a partner in my healthcare, someone who actually respected me and though he knew more than me, he didn't use that as an opportunity to belittle me, he listened because he truly believed I had information that could help him make a better diagnosis. This is just one of the many stories I have, both good and bad. I'll never forget how my orthodontist treated me: like I was some petulant little girl that just didn't want to wear braces. Then how my surgeon treated me: like a human, a young lady that needed to be heard if he wanted to make the right diagnosis.
What a difference different doctors can make. Your orthodontist was definitely in the group John Oliver was talking about but it sounds like your dentist and surgeon were in the group with Dr Mike and what he hopes the future doctors are like.
I'm so sorry you went through that, hon. I had to have jaw surgery too. 3.5 years lf braces, tooth extractions, all leading up to surgery. Nowadays I suffer from TMJ, but I would never undo that surgery. I looked ridiculous before it.
@@markymarksthirdnipple8305 I don't have a mouthguard, but I get nerve blocks at the pain clinic and between that and percocet im doin pretty good =)
Doctors are human, humans makes mistakes
@@triskalion9627 not long lasting mistakes like disregarding the patient's complaints about pains. Especially with visible proof as severe as it was said to be.
I was so happy seeing this John Oliver episode on Sunday, because not many people know that this goes on. I got sunburned in Mexico on vacation, and my doctor (who has since been replaced) actually said that he never knew black people could get seriously sunburned... MY OWN DOCTOR😑. I also saw a dermatologist for my eczema, and he told me to drop out of school (I'm a dental hygienist, was still in school at this time) because I'll be washing my hands all the time, and there arent many black hygienist for that reason😑😑😑😑, which is complete bs, and my hands are doing just fine. Oh, and getting an IUD removed, one of the arms broke off of it. Had a surgery to remove it, and long story short, its still there, I'm always in pain, and I've been told to just take motrin😂. These things and more have happened to just me, so think of all of the women and people of color who also go through this. It's not isolated incidents, it's literally life for us, from beginning to end, and I'm glad theres a tiny spotlight on it. I could go on and on, but I'd be writing a book. Thx for the video Dr. Mike!💗
*edit: the dermatologist mentioned hand washing because its required often in my profession, and my hands could get dry. Problem is, that I never had eczema on my hands, so that wasnt even an issue*
oh wow, I'm sorry you had to go through that. Since when do people choose their career depending on color/race? 🤦🏻♀️ you do your think girl 👩🎓👌
My neighbor who is a 40 year old black man, also thought black people couldn't get sunburned...till he stayed out at the beach all day with no shade. Ouch poor was hurting for a week.
It is shocking how many people dont think balck people can get sunburned or even have skin cancer. I worry about your IUD though cause if its causing you pain still, it may be doing you internal damage. Id go to a different hospital or something cause that sounds potentially dangerous
That doctor about the sunburn is a fucking moron.
A couple years ago my mom was diagnosed with precancerous skin growths and had to get them removed and now sees her dermatologist regularly, my mom is white and my dad is mexican so my mom was worried about my skin and what my chances of getting skin cancer and what i should look out for.
This led to a conversation about race and skin with her doctor. The doctor said that she often sees black patients who have never used sunscreen because they believe they never needed it and that often they were in advanced stages of skin cancer because they believed that it was just a blemish or they needed lotion or they just couldn't believe black people got skin cancer.
The fact that there's a stupid doctor out there who probably advised someone that they were fine and they might not have been given proper care and died breaks my heart.
I know how scared I was when they did my mom's biopsy and when she needed her procedure that I never want that for anyone when it could be prevented.
Wait... is their a stereotype that black people don't like to wash their hands a lot?!?
My gallbladder attack was diagnosed at the ER as bad gas, and they sent me home. It was removed 10 days later, after my doctor ordered the right testing. That isn’t my only time doctors have brushed me off. That was just the most insane example. There is also weight bias present in the medical field (and general public). I lost 165 pounds over 8 years ago and the difference in how I’m treated is night & day.
Congratulations 😢❤. I am so proud of you and so happy for you. I know that must’ve been so difficult for you and I know it must be so emotionally traumatizing to see the disparities firsthand…. It’s absolutely true. When you’re skinny or beautiful, or a man, they are more likely to take you seriously. The biases around obesity are real. Just like those around women especially women of color. I hope you aren’t your ideal weight, and I hope you are no matter what, happy and healthy and satisfied in your own body, no matter what. You deserve better and you always did and still do.
As a Canadian I fined the term, "lower quality hospital" really sad. For profit health care is a crime. Maybe some of those millions of dollars for studies should go to improving those hospitals.
Or you know, our fucking tax money. Lol
Same, as a British person it's an alien concept to me
Don't take money from the studies, they're important. Take money from the military, the police, the government, wall street, etc.
*find
Why on earth would you take funding from life saving medical studies???
What is most frustrating is when female doctors show even more bias than male doctors. I find this every once and a while and it is so disempowering when I interact with these doctors.
It’s funny you mention that because in 2016, my mom was experiencing pain and discomfort in her upper abdominal area and she was vomiting. She was going to a free clinic at the time and the nurse practitioner, who was a woman, told her that she had acid reflux disease. My mom also did stress test and it showed no signs that something was wrong with heart. As a result my mom was taking Nexium and Mylanta to relieve the supposed acid reflux. However, one Friday, she was hurting really bad and she drove herself to the ER. After a few tests, they told her that her enzyme levels were high as if she knows what that meant. She went home, and we went to Maryland the next day. After we came back from Maryland, she wasn’t sick but she wasn’t 100% so she went back to the ER, and they told her she had a heart attack. She stayed in the hospital for a few days, and they did a few tests, including catheterization test. They found that she had three blocked arteries, one was completely damaged, and there was nothing they could do but give her Plavix. A few months later, she went to the heart doctor for an appointment and there was this nurse practitioner who was sent to the office from another city. She told my mom that the doctor that she worked for could help her get bypass surgery. So my mom met up with the doctor and with the surgeon, and in June 2017, they did triple bypass surgery on her, and she hasn’t had any pains since then.
Now, she’s dealing with kidney failure and is doing peritoneal dialysis at home.
Yeah! In my twenties I went to a gynecologist because I had debilitating pain during pms and she said - oh that's not especially bad - I have patients who faint because of the pain. But luckily what she prescribed worked wonders and I haven't had any problems since then although those period pains plagued me for so many years. So ...mixed feelings.
Twice as good for half the respect, except 'twice as good' is still judged by the existing establishment.
If that's true about the statistic for maternal mortality, we should still be pretty mortified that the number hasn't gone up, it's always been high and we've failed to bring it down in 20 years of medical advancements
this is EXACTLY what I was thinking. Dr Mike didnt disprove anything it's actually worse
I think what he’s saying is that it hasn’t actually gone up, it’s always been the same just with better forms and research they are better able to find that it’s the bigger number rather then the smaller and that they needed to find the reason for that
Also the fact he glossed over in this is that US maternal mortality is the highest in the developed world. All of the developed world is dealing with obesity. We need to do better for our mothers. Only nurse midwives attend low risk women and a country wide system in place for safe home birth like they have in Canada and the UK is a great place to start.
There was a study on the difference in Maternal Mortality Rate (MMR) between Chile and the US which concluded that the main factor in improving MMR was patient education. Chile has a similar level of MMR as the US (in many years they have the second lowest MMR in the Americas, after Canada, which is always top).
Interestingly the study also notes that legality of abortion does not seem to affect MMR. In Chile the MMR actually went down after they completely banned abortion.
They have recently legalised abortion again, so it will be interesting to see if there is any effect.
Whofan06 agreed. Additionally, Oliver’s point was that it was highest in the “developed” world, not that it increased, so I’m not sure why Dr. Mike focused on the latter instead of Oliver’s argument. To his credit, he did highlight a number of times that the system is failing “minority” groups, but he seemed pretty resistant at the idea that doctors themselves, over all of medicine’s history have applied biased beliefs as a norm. There is hope, which must be highlighted, but I think it is important to remember that most doctors today are not “of the new generation” and have hence not benefitted from new ways of practicing medicine. I understand how difficult it must for him to watch and that he is absolutely correct in his pursuit of further factors contributing to the stats presented by Oliver, but in my opinion, he really should have acknowledged medical professionals’ role in more depth. This became especially apparent to me when Oliver presented the study that factored in socioeconomic factors and Dr.Mike repeated his point on the higher likelihood for African Americans to go to lower-quality hospitals.
I really appreciate that he researched Oliver’s video before posting, I think that was a great call. I wish he and/or Oliver did explore the medical history of specific racist beliefs of certain non-existing physiological differences (I.e. “thicker skin”)-that would have given more context as to why certain unsubstantiated beliefs should not be tolerated in the medical community.
Finally, for the sake of precision, I think the use of “blacks” or “whites” in medical terms should be handled with care. For example, diabetic instances in African Americans vs African immigrants will be different, as well as other biological differences. And that is also true for European Americans vs European immigrants. Heck, only in my tiny country of Rwanda, Hutu populations are much more likely to be lactose intolerant compared to Tutsi ppl-so it is important to recognize that biological differences are ethnic-based, not racially based.
I love Dr. Mike & appreciate all his videos. I just want to clarify that heart attack symptoms in women are not atypical, it’s typical for women. I think once this is the norm amongst doctors, we’ll begin to see a significant improvement in female heart health care. ❤
Thank you! Hearing him say that bothered me too.
@@courtneyisaseagull To learn the jargon of a subject you know nothing about, add that field to your search. Google "define atypical medical" and you'd get the medical definition: "unexpected clinical presentation" e.g., stage-IV colorectal cancer without bleeding or obstruction.
If it's not one of the more common symptoms, it's atypical. He gave the jaw example for women.