For centuries, women have been excluded from medical research, leading to a healthcare system that often misses, misdiagnoses, or dismisses their health issues, according to experts. Dr Kate Young, a public health researcher at Monash University, says that because medical knowledge has been produced largely by men, doctors frequently resort to 'hysteria' narratives to explain women's persistent symptoms.
In a study published in Feminism & Psychology, Young found that the historical 'hysteria' discourse is often used when discussing 'difficult' women—those for whom treatment is not helpful or who hold different views of their condition. Rather than acknowledging the limits of medical knowledge, doctors often blame women, expecting them to accept their illness and conform to traditional gender roles.
Young’s work highlights how endometriosis patients are frequently viewed by clinicians as 'reproductive bodies with hysterical tendencies'. One gynaecologist told her: 'Do mad people get endo or does endo make you mad? It’s probably a bit of both.' Another said: 'There’s a lot of psychology, just as much as there is pathology in gynaecology.'
This bias extends beyond gynaecology. A male GP once told the author: 'I’ve never had a fibromyalgia patient who wasn’t batshit crazy.' Dr Janine Austin Clayton of the US National Institutes of Health notes that because most medical research has focused on male biology, 'we literally know less about every aspect of female biology compared to male biology'.
Historically, early anatomy sketches intentionally depicted women with wider hips and smaller craniums to reinforce the idea that women are primarily reproductive bodies. This mindset has persisted, with women’s health issues often dismissed as psychosomatic or exaggerated.
