09/19/2026
Women are significantly less likely than men to be offered aggressive medical treatment -- surgery, a stent, a strong painkiller -- for the very same conditions, according to a sweeping new analysis of global research. Reviewing 38 studies that directly compared the care given to male and female patients, researchers at the University of St. Andrews found that in 33 of them, women were less likely than men with the identical diagnosis to receive this kind of "active" treatment. The findings, published this month in the journal PLOS One, span some of the most serious conditions in medicine.
The pattern turned up nearly everywhere they looked. Women having a heart attack or living with heart failure were more often handed medication while men were sent for a bypass or a stent, and women were less likely to be prescribed statins. Men with Parkinson's were more often referred for deep brain stimulation; men with liver failure were more likely to receive a transplant. Women on dialysis waited longer with a catheter instead of permanent access. And across conditions, women were less likely to be given opioids for their pain.
Crucially, not one of the studies pointed to a clinical guideline recommending that women be treated differently -- meaning the gap appears to come not from medicine, but from assumption. "For clinicians, the findings are a prompt to check whether treatment is being offered on clinical grounds rather than assumption," said Dr. Andrew O'Malley, who co-led the study. Doctors, he noted, more often chalk women's symptoms up to anxiety and make more diagnostic errors with female patients -- even when the test results are right in front of them.
What unsettled the researchers was not the direction of the gap but how relentlessly it held. "While the direction of the findings was not a surprise, the consistency was," said Dr. Miriam Veenhuizen of the St. Andrews School of Medicine. "The same pattern appeared in cardiology, surgery, transplant medicine and emergency care, and it survived statistical adjustment in most studies." It is the latest confirmation of what Wes Streeting, Britain's former health secretary, bluntly called "medical misogyny" -- a system that, again and again, takes women's pain and illness less seriously than men's, sometimes with deadly results.
--> This latest study is the latest chapter in a very old story. For Elinor Cleghorn's sweeping history of how medicine has dismissed women's pain for two thousand years -- from ancient theories of the 'wandering womb' to the modern misdiagnosis of endometriosis and autoimmune disease -- we recommend 'Unwell Women: Misdiagnosis and Myth in a Man-Made World' at https://bookshop.org/a/8011/9780593182970 (Bookshop) and https://amzn.to/4g3sgyQ (Amazon)
For breast cancer oncologist Elizabeth Comen's bestselling history of medicine's centuries of dismissal, mistreatment, and misunderstanding of women's bodies, told through the eleven systems of the body, we recommend "All in Her Head: The Truth and Lies Early Medicine Taught Us About Women's Bodies and Why It Matters Today" at https://bookshop.org/a/8011/9780063293014 (Bookshop) and https://amzn.to/4lKkRoO (Amazon)
For two books for tween and teen girls focused on female health, we recommend "Below Your Belt: How to Be Queen of Your Pelvic Region" for ages 9 to 14 (https://www.amightygirl.com/below-your-belt) and "Taking Care of Your 'Girls': A Breast Health Guide for Girls, Teens, and In-Betweens" for ages 10 and up (https://www.amightygirl.com/taking-care-of-your-girls)
If your Mighty Girl wants to imagine herself as a nurse or doctor saving the day, we've showcased our top picks of children's books about pioneering female medical professionals, toys, science kits, and clothing in our blog post, "Medical Heroes" at https://www.amightygirl.com/blog?p=29667
For books about both real-life and fictional girls and women who confronted sexism in a multitude of forms, visit our "S*x Discrimination" section at http://amgrl.co/1jdxKIy
To read more about this analysis of the disparities in how women and men are treated, visit The Guardian at https://www.theguardian.com/science/2026/sep/16/women-with-same-health-conditions-as-men-less-likely-to-be-offered-active-treatment
