Women Die Without Female Doctors

If you are having a heart attack, would you rather have a female or male doctor attending to you?

Well, that depends on whether you’re a female or male yourself. A study of more than half a million cases has found that women who suffer from heart attacks are generally unluckier than their male counterparts — they are less likely to survive. But why? 

There seems to be a link to the gender of their doctor. When patients shared the same gender as their doctor, they were more likely to survive, with the probability of death falling by just over 0.6 per cent. 

However, survival rates start to look very different when patients and doctors are from the opposite gender.

Male doctors were linked to worse outcomes, particularly for women. The gender gap in survival more than tripled to 0.7 per cent, whereby 12.6 per cent of men died compared to 13.3 per cent of women.

How significant is this in terms of actual lives saved? A percentage of 0.7 may seem small, but when you look at the researchers’ sample, 1,500 fewer women would have died — women who were treated by male doctors — if their survival rate was the same as women treated by female physicians.

Interestingly, women had better survival with male doctors who have many female ER colleagues. This implies that female doctors are able to somehow transfer their good practices to their male colleagues. 

Why does this shocking gender disparity exist? Some research from Australia and the UK suggest that women’s heart attacks are being misdiagnosed, leading them to receive sub-standard care. 

While we’re on the subject, cardiovascular disease — not breast cancer, as is commonly assumed — is the leading cause of death among women in Malaysia (and men, as well). 

Every woman should be aware of her risk of heart disease and manage her lifestyle accordingly.

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