Q: Sometimes I feel like my doctor dismisses my health concerns or blames my symptoms on stress without ordering any testing. Is this medical gaslighting? And if it is, what can I do about it?
In recent years, “gaslighting” has become a hot topic. But the phenomenon isn’t just recognized in personal relationships and workplaces — it’s seen in medical settings as well.
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While there’s often a subjective element to medical gaslighting — if it feels like gaslighting, there’s a good chance that it is — the term does have a formal definition: In a 2024 issue of the American Journal of Medicine, medical gaslighting was defined as “an act that invalidates a patient’s genuine clinical concern without proper medical evaluation because of physician ignorance, implicit bias or medical paternalism.”
This can happen with any symptoms, but it has especially become an issue for people with long COVID who have reported being dismissed by health care professionals, experiencing delayed diagnoses and deferred treatment, according to a 2022 study.
In addition, people with acute or chronic Lyme disease reported experiencing gaslighting in their quest for medical treatment, according to a 2023 paper.
Here are some signs that you may be experiencing medical gaslighting, according to experts:
— You feel like your health care provider isn’t listening to you or is continuously interrupting you.
— You feel like your concerns are being minimized or diminished when you describe your symptoms to your doctor.
— The physician attributes your symptoms to stress or anxiety without doing tests to rule out other potential causes.
— The doctor blames your symptoms on your age, gender or stage of life (“It’s just perimenopause“) or your lifestyle habits without investigating.
[SEE: What Makes a Good Doctor: Qualities to Look For]
Causes of medical gaslighting
Unlike with other forms of gaslighting, health care professionals may not be doing it intentionally.
“Sometimes, it’s simply because they haven’t seen your condition before or it’s a different presentation, and they may jump to premature conclusions about what’s going on,” says Robin Stern, cofounder of the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence and author of the book “The Gaslight Effect.” “Doctors, just like the rest of us, may not think as clearly when under time pressure or when stressed and may not pay as much attention as we — or even they — would like.”
Besides the time crunch, there could be other factors at play:
— Looks can be deceiving. It could be that the physician doesn’t believe that you could be sick because you look healthy and fit.
— Difficulty making the diagnosis. Your doctor may believe what you’re saying but be unable to identify and treat the condition that’s causing your symptoms.
— Poor communication or understanding. It could be that the clinician isn’t a great communicator or misinterpreted what you were saying.
“It may even be that what comes across as gaslighting is a demonstration of the clinician’s own uncertainty or even insecurity, whether related to a rare diagnosis, an unusual symptom or something else,” says Dr. Jonathan Marron, a physician and bioethicist at Harvard Medical School and director of clinical ethics at the Harvard Medical School Center for Bioethics.
[READ: When to Get a Second Opinion]
Effects of medical gaslighting
Whether it’s done intentionally or not, feeling dismissed or ignored by your doctor can be upsetting and demoralizing. It also can lead to erroneous or missed diagnoses and delayed treatment, and it can make people less likely to seek medical care.
It can even lead to “medical trauma,” a subjective form of psychological harm that results from complicated interactions between a patient and medical staff or the medical environment, according to research published in a 2024 issue of the journal Current Psychology.
“It can make you discount your own belief in what you have described, making you feel like you don’t even know yourself,” says study coauthor Devora Shapiro, a professor of medical ethics in the department of social medicine at Ohio University’s Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine in Cleveland. “If the denial that the patient is experiencing something real continues, it can make a patient question their own sanity, creating (the potential for) long-lasting trauma or other persistent ill effects to develop.”
[READ: Most Common Health Problems]
How to handle medical gaslighting
If you feel like you’ve been gaslit by your health care provider, there are steps to prevent it from happening again.
— Plan ahead for your next interaction. Before your next appointment, make a list of what you want to discuss with the doctor.
— Bring someone with you. Consider bringing a trusted friend or family member to the appointment to lend support and to corroborate what you’re reporting.
— Be specific. To increase your chances of being truly heard, be very precise about your symptoms and describe how they’re interfering with your daily life with concrete examples.
— Rephrase your question or request. Try rephrasing how you explain your symptoms to see if that leads to a different response. For example, if your health care provider is inclined to blame your symptoms on stress or anxiety, you could point out that the connection is in the other direction: People often experience depression or anxiety because of their symptoms, rather than the other way around.
— Stay calm. However the conversation goes, stay calm because getting angry or lashing out at the physician isn’t going to help matters, Shapiro says. It could even escalate the tension and discord between you.
— Be direct. If you continue to feel like your concerns are being dismissed or minimized, talk to your physician about this more directly. Tell your doctor, “What you’re saying isn’t working for me” or “I don’t think you’re hearing my concerns. I need us to keep looking for answers or consider other possibilities,” Stern suggests.
[READ MD vs. DO: What’s the Difference?]
If these strategies don’t help, consider getting a second opinion or switching to a new doctor.
“It may be that this doctor is not a good fit for you,” says Anna Hayburn, a health psychologist for the neuromuscular department at The Cleveland Clinic. “Look for a specialist or a provider who is collaborative.”
Ultimately, it’s important to stay true to yourself. Remember: You deserve to receive compassionate health care from a good doctor. Your physical and emotional health and well-being depend on it.
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Medical Gaslighting: What Should I Do If My Doctor Is Dismissing My Health Concerns? originally appeared on usnews.com