Pain and Prejudice: How the Medical System Ignores Women-And What We Can Do About It

by Gabrielle Jackson

Overview

“[A] powerful account of the sexism cooked into medical care ... will motivate readers to advocate for themselves.”—Publishers Weekly STARRED Review

A groundbreaking and feminist work of investigative reporting:

• Explains why women experience healthcare differently than men
• Shares the author’s journey of fighting for an endometriosis diagnosis

In Pain and Prejudice, acclaimed investigative reporter Gabrielle Jackson takes readers behind the scenes of doctor’s offices, pharmaceutical companies, and research labs to show that—at nearly every level of healthcare—men’s health claims are treated as default, whereas women’s are often viewed as a-typical, exaggerated, and even completely fabricated. The impacts of this bias? Women are losing time, money, and their lives trying to navigate a healthcare system designed for men.

Almost all medical research today is performed on men or male mice, making most treatments tailored to male bodies only. Even conditions that are overwhelmingly more common in women, such as chronic pain, are researched on mostly male bodies. Doctors and researchers who do specialize in women’s healthcare are penalized financially, as procedures performed on men pay higher. Meanwhile, women are reporting feeling ignored and dismissed at their doctor’s offices on a regular basis.

Jackson interweaves these and more stunning revelations in the book with her own story of suffering from endometriosis, a condition that affects up to 20% of American women but is poorly understood and frequently misdiagnosed. She also includes an up-to-the-minute epilogue on the ways that Covid-19 are impacting women in different and sometimes more long-lasting ways than men.

A rich combination of journalism and personal narrative, Pain and Prejudice reveals a dangerously flawed system and offers solutions for a safer, more equitable future.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781771647168
Publisher:	Greystone Books
Publication date:	03/08/2021
Pages:	392
Sales rank:	527,312
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 8.90(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

GABRIELLE JACKSON is an associate news editor at Guardian Australia. She was first diagnosed with endometriosis in 2001, and since 2015 she has been writing about how women’s pain is treated in modern healthcare systems.

Table of Contents

Introduction 1

1 Repeat after me, vulva: the female reproductive system 19

2 'Whosoever toucheth her shall be unclean': menstruation and menopause 42

3 From clitoridectomy to the talking cure: a history of hysteria 80

4 Neither Madonna nor whore: rethinking female sexuality 117

5 It's the culture, stupid: understanding modern medical practice 158

6 'The pain that can't be seen': a new appreciation of women's pain 215

7 Time to ditch the bikini: the women's health conditions you never hear about 259

8 'Ripe for disruption': why medical science must improve its knowledge of women 295

Epilogue: Covid-19 and chronic pain 321

Afterword 343

Acknowledgements 347

Notes 349

Index 375

Editorial Reviews

★ 03/22/2021

Journalist Jackson debuts with a powerful account of the sexism cooked into medical care. Her own experience with endometriosis, “a chronic inflammatory disease in which tissue similar to the lining of the uterus... grows in other parts of the body,” is central, and she reports that it and other diseases that affect mainly women are understudied and often go undiagnosed. Because of this, she reports, women’s pain is more likely to be ignored by the medical system than men’s. Further, she writes that despite the good intentions of many doctors, sexism exists in medicine because health care plays a role in policing women (health care as an institution ensures doctors maintain control over women’s reproductive systems, for example, via such means as birth control). To bolster her case, Jackson gives a historical overview of how ailing women came to be viewed as “hysterical” in ancient Greece, and brings things up to the present with the observation that, when pain is ignored, “and when we get angry about it, we’re diagnosed with mental illnesses.” This is less a step-by-step guide to fixing the problem than a passionate survey that will motivate readers to advocate for themselves. With its wealth of information, this hits the mark. (Mar.)

Publishers Weekly

This book could not be more timely or important.”
—The Guardian

“A powerful account of the sexism cooked into medical care….a passionate survey that will motivate readers to advocate for themselves. With its wealth of information, this hits the mark.”
—Publishers Weekly STARRED review

“Jackson’s approach is both broad and deep, going beyond individual stories to force more complex questioning of the embedded values of Western health-care systems.”
—Chatelaine

“Pain and Prejudice is an excellent, eye-opening book that I will recommend to my patients, my trainees—and my friends.”
—Dr. Lori Brotto, author of Better Sex Through Mindfulness

“Gabrielle Jackson is a brilliant journalist and a wonderful feminist, and incapable of being dull.”
—New Scientist

“Gabrielle Jackson gives a spirited 21st-century voice to a tale-as-old-as-time issue. As part of a growing body of literature on women’s pain, Jackson seeks to understand why, but she also challenges us to ask 'what next?' Pain & Prejudice is not simply a call out of the history of women’s health—it’s a clear-eyed call to action for all of us to do better now.”
—Abby Norman, author of Ask Me About My Uterus: A Quest to Make Doctors Believe in Women's Pain

“Gabrielle Jackson deploys facts to tear away the destructive myths that surround women's health.”
—The Guardian Australia

“A major contribution to feminist writing of the 21st century.”
—Caroline de Costa, Professor of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, James Cook University

From the Publisher

2021-01-07
An exploration of how “women’s pain is all too often dismissed, their illnesses misdiagnosed or ignored."

Jackson, an associate news editor at the Guardian, breezily translates decades of medical research, interviews, and statistics into a book that challenges what we think we know about women’s health and pain. The author, who suffers from endometriosis, expands on her earlier journalism on the condition, writing of the startling misconceptions surrounding cisgender women’s treatment in the medical system. Jackson locates the foundation of modern medicine’s dismissal and misdiagnoses of countless women by detailing the history of hysteria and its insidious consequences for women. For example, she highlights how most people would be surprised to learn that “in 2004, 7.4 million women over 60 years of age died of cardiovascular disease compared with 6.3 million men.” This misconception—that heart disease afflicts the male population more than the female population—is one of many Jackson corrects throughout the book. She adroitly synthesizes complex medical studies and interviews with medical professionals, patients, and researchers. One conclusion is that medical professionals’ current lack of consensus on the best treatments for women with chronic diseases is due to the paucity of clinical trials and dedicated funding for research into how these diseases specifically affect cisgender female patients—or female rodents in trials. Jackson is most effective when she brings together disparate sources and findings to reach digestible conclusions. The author’s personal tale of her struggle with endometriosis creates an engaging familiarity with readers, but her occasionally derisive tone toward men, lumped together as an undifferentiated group, could alienate an otherwise receptive audience. Nonetheless, Jackson is effective in her presentation of pertinent, often surprising information that could help many women stay healthy and find quality, personalized health care.

An informative study of cisgender female care in medicine, from hysteria to Covid-19, with a focus on chronic pain.

Kirkus Reviews