Male-centric medicine: Why women’s health is EMS’s next big challenge

In this episode of Inside EMS, Chris and Kelly are joined by Tim Redding, founder and CEO of Emergency Education Consultants, to explore a topic that’s reshaping how we think about medicine: male-centric healthcare. Tim shares insights from Dr. Alyson J. McGregor’s groundbreaking book, “Sex Matters”, which explores how medical research and education have historically centered on white male patients, leaving women underserved and misdiagnosed.

From cardiac care to drug research, Tim explains how biases have permeated everything from symptom recognition to treatment protocols. Did you know that women experiencing heart attacks rarely exhibit the “classic” symptoms, like chest pain? Or that 8 out of 10 drugs pulled from the market between 1997 and 2001 were due to severe side effects in women?

If you’re someone passionate about improving patient outcomes, this episode will make you rethink what you know – and don’t know – about women’s health in EMS.

Memorable quotes

“Medicine historically has been white males doing the doctoring, writing the textbooks and doing the studies. So, what that has led to, by no one’s fault, is to this very male-centric view of medicine.”

“The most accurate tool for confirming and diagnosing MI in women is an MRI and that really blew my mind.  I can’t think of any time that I’ve heard a doc say, ‘Let’s get an MRI for that cardiac female patient.’”

Enjoying the show? Contact the Inside EMS team at theshow@ems1.com to share ideas, suggestions and feedback, or let us know if you’d like to join us as a guest.