I actually haven’t seen a real difference between the way men and women appear to be treated (although I am not privy to other patient’s consultations). I have, however, seen a small difference in the way men and women react to treatment (female patients tend to be more demanding on staff and see treatment as a right whereas men see it as something that has to happen in order to get a problem fixed) but I don’t think it is as significant as the age gap. Most people who go in to end stage renal failure at an older age seems to find it more difficult to adapt whereas someone who starts dialysis at a young age appears to accept it more.

I realise, as someone with a science degree, that these views are entirely objective. I’m afraid don’t have any hard data to hand so I can only go on observations.

I’m a proponent of not reaching conclusions until you’ve asked the right questions and gotten the right kind of data, but it seems to me that your argument here is undercut by the work cited. I haven’t read the original research article, but it appears that the people included in this study were all in end-stage renal disease. Unless women are significantly more likely to be diagnosed with end-stage renal disease as a result of a lack of appropriate diagnosis and care prior to this (i.e., they somehow manage to make it through the system with serious kidney disease without it being picked up until they’re clinically very advanced), then they should have an equal chance of making the list as men. These women (and men) would be under the care of a nephrologist for their kidney disease, not an ob-gyn, etc. It’s my understanding that people are added to the transplant list by a nephrologist with specialized training in transplant service, not by general practitioners or family medicine docs.

What you’re saying could have merit if physicians are less likely to refer women to appropriate nephrology specialists until their disease is more advanced than men, thus making them a poorer candidate for transplant. But, since this study controlled for those issues (from the article: adjusting for factors that would affect the patient’s survival after surgery), what you’ve got here is a group of people who should be on a level playing field and who, obviously, aren’t.

Women are far more likely to go to their doctor for tests and are far more used to talking about their bodies than men.

Perhaps because men wait till later to go to their doctor, they are treated more quickly because it has become more urgent.

However, despite women being more forward about consulting their doctor, I think they are, conversely, less likely to want treatment. They usually respect their health/bodies more than men and see treatment/operations as an invasion whereas men are more of the mentality of “OK, get the operation, get it fixed”.

These thoughts are my opinion but my fiance is a nurse and has told me many times of the differences between men and women when in hospital for treatment.

So… it disproportionally affects women and it results in more women dying? But we’re somehow getting ahead of ourselves by suggesting either that the patriarchy might play a role, or that women dying is a *bad* thing?

My grandmother is 94 and I have taken her for regular check-ups on occasion and have witnessed how she is treated. This is a woman who still lives on her own and has taken excellent care of herself, and yet doctors talk to her as though she’s 5. Somehow, if my grandfather were still around, I suspect his treatment would be different.

I definitely think that at least some of this is unconscious on both parties’ parts, in a very self-fulfilling prophesy way. An older man might expect more respect and therefore act entitled to it, an expectation the doctor might then unconsciously pick up on and conform to, giving the man even more reason to expect that good treatment the next time, and so making him carry himself with even more confidence. The older woman, on the other hand, doesn’t expect respect (and why should she? she’s never gotten it before) and so will tolerate a less respectful attitude, or even just behave/speak more naively and submissively, which the doctor may then use as an opening to roll over her, quelling her further. (Of course some people are just dicks and don’t respect women no matter *how* they act, which is true for doctors just as much as for anyone else of course. This certainly isn’t meant to sound like victim-blaming! More like self-defense-through-self-identifying-as-a-bitch-who’s-gonna-get-what-she-came-for. ^^)

Don’t get me started on doctors who treat Alzheimer’s patients like toddlers, either. Up until 2 months ago, my dad was quite lucid and coherent, even if he couldn’t remember what he ate for lunch.