This is the Weight and Healthcare newsletter! If you like what you are reading, please consider subscribing and/or sharing! Over the years that I’ve been writing and talking about the ways in which weight stigma shows up in healthcare, I’ve heard from many higher weight people who went for their annual visit to the gynecologist, only to be told that the doctor/practice doesn’t have the correct size speculum to examine them.
I was in the ER last Monday. I’ll spare the symptoms but they were worrisome. Took me straight back, hooked me up to a heart monitor/BP/blood ox (all correct size.) Did labs, an EKG, abdominal ultrasound, abdominal CT with contrast dye. At no point did they weigh me. If it’s so damn medically necessary shouldn’t the ER folks GAF? For the record, I weigh around 330lbs. Did find something to follow up on but thankfully nothing urgent. My mental health improved if not my physical health.
Yes!! To all of this. From chairs to cuffs to braces, I've encountered a lot of these discrepancies. I've been fat since childhood but didn't have access to healthcare for most of my life, so I didn't learn until recently how hard it can be to get equitable and quality care.
I broke my ankle in 2020, my first broken bone ever, and I gained weight during the pandemic so I weigh 350 now and carry my weight in some places more than others--like my hips/butt and lower legs. They wanted to put me in an ankle boot, but only had one small size that wouldn't fit me and said a larger one was not an option. My current healthcare is the best I've had so far, but they still made it clear in this situation that they saw my size as the problem, and not their lack of options.
For the broken ankle, I was put in a cast instead that immediately loosened, I had to go back and get it removed and remade and the same thing happened again, so I just lived with it until it could come off. Now it's two years later, I can't be active for more than 20 minutes without severe pain in that ankle and I'm going to need to ask my doctor about it, because they said it 'healed as much as it was going to' but I don't understand why it still kind of feels broken.
Speaking of blood pressure cuffs, I didn't learn until this year that they can be used on the lower part of your arm. Blood pressure readings have always been really painful for me, either because my skin's sensitive or due to upper arm fat, and a nurse recently said 'oh, if it hurts you we can just do it this way!' and quickly and easily accommodated me.
I was so surprised and thrilled to take that information with me to future appointments...and then at my next one, the nurse taking my information said 'oh well we CAN do that but it's less effective, so let's try the normal way first' and just went ahead and ignored how much it hurt me. Then she commented on my high heart rate as though it should worry me, when I'd just told her about the pain I was in AND their nook for taking vitals had a chair too small for me to sit in, so I had to stand during them.
I was in the ER last Monday. I’ll spare the symptoms but they were worrisome. Took me straight back, hooked me up to a heart monitor/BP/blood ox (all correct size.) Did labs, an EKG, abdominal ultrasound, abdominal CT with contrast dye. At no point did they weigh me. If it’s so damn medically necessary shouldn’t the ER folks GAF? For the record, I weigh around 330lbs. Did find something to follow up on but thankfully nothing urgent. My mental health improved if not my physical health.
Yes!! To all of this. From chairs to cuffs to braces, I've encountered a lot of these discrepancies. I've been fat since childhood but didn't have access to healthcare for most of my life, so I didn't learn until recently how hard it can be to get equitable and quality care.
I broke my ankle in 2020, my first broken bone ever, and I gained weight during the pandemic so I weigh 350 now and carry my weight in some places more than others--like my hips/butt and lower legs. They wanted to put me in an ankle boot, but only had one small size that wouldn't fit me and said a larger one was not an option. My current healthcare is the best I've had so far, but they still made it clear in this situation that they saw my size as the problem, and not their lack of options.
For the broken ankle, I was put in a cast instead that immediately loosened, I had to go back and get it removed and remade and the same thing happened again, so I just lived with it until it could come off. Now it's two years later, I can't be active for more than 20 minutes without severe pain in that ankle and I'm going to need to ask my doctor about it, because they said it 'healed as much as it was going to' but I don't understand why it still kind of feels broken.
Speaking of blood pressure cuffs, I didn't learn until this year that they can be used on the lower part of your arm. Blood pressure readings have always been really painful for me, either because my skin's sensitive or due to upper arm fat, and a nurse recently said 'oh, if it hurts you we can just do it this way!' and quickly and easily accommodated me.
I was so surprised and thrilled to take that information with me to future appointments...and then at my next one, the nurse taking my information said 'oh well we CAN do that but it's less effective, so let's try the normal way first' and just went ahead and ignored how much it hurt me. Then she commented on my high heart rate as though it should worry me, when I'd just told her about the pain I was in AND their nook for taking vitals had a chair too small for me to sit in, so I had to stand during them.