Medical Misogyny

Medical misogyny remains one of the most persistent and damaging forms of bias within healthcare, and it is so often normalised. It appears in the minimisation of pain, in the assumption that women and girls are exaggerating, in the tendency to attribute complex symptoms to stress, hormones, weight, or emotion before proper investigation has taken place. It is reinforced by a medical culture that has historically treated male bodies as the default, leaving women’s symptoms more likely to be misunderstood, delayed, or dismissed altogether.