WEBVTT

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We all go to doctors,

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and we do so with trust and blind faith

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that the test they are ordering
and the medications they're prescribing

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are based upon evidence,

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evidence that's designed to help us.

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However, the reality is

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that that hasn't always
been the case for everyone.

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What if I told you that the medical
science discovered over the past century

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has been based on
only half the population?

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I'm an emergency medicine doctor.

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I was trained to be prepared
in a medical emergency.

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It's about saving lives.
How cool is that?

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Okay, there's a lot of runny noses
and stubbed toes,

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but no matter who walks
through the door to the ER,

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we order the same tests,

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we prescribe the same medication

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without ever thinking about
the sex or gender of our patients.

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Why would we?

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We were never taught that there were
any differences between men and women.

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A recent Government Accountability study
revealed that 80 percent of the drugs

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withdrawn from the market

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are due to side effects on women.

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So let's think about that for a minute.

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Why are we discovering
side effects on women

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only after a drug has been released
to the market?

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Do you know that it takes years for a drug

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to go from an idea to being tested
on cells in a laboratory,

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to animal studies,

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to then clinical trials on humans,

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finally to go through
a regulatory approval process,

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to be available for your doctor
to prescribe to you,

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not to mention the millions
and billions of dollars of funding

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it takes to go through that process.

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So why are we discovering
unacceptable side effects

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on half the population
after that has gone through?

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What's happening?

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Well, it turns out that those cells
used in that laboratory,

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they're male cells,

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and the animals used
in the animal studies were male animals,

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and the clinical trials have been
performed almost exclusively on men.

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How is it that the male model became
our framework for medical research?

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Let's look at an example that has
been popularized in the media,

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and it has to do
with the sleep aid Ambien.

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Ambien was released on the market
over 20 years ago,

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and since then, hundreds of millions
of prescriptions have been written,

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primarily to women because women
suffer more sleep disorders than men.

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But just this past year,

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the Food and Drug Administration
recommended cutting the dose in half

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for women only,

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because they just realized
that women metabolize the drug

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at a slower rate than men,

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causing them to wake up in the morning
with more of the active drug in the system

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and then they're drowsy and they're
getting behind the wheel of the car,

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and they're at risk
for motor vehicle accidents.

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And I can't help but think,
as an emergency physician,

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how many of my patients
that I've cared for over the years

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that were involved
in a motor vehicle accident

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possibly could have been prevented

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if this type of analysis was performed
and acted upon 20 years ago

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when this drug was first released.

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How many other things
need to be analyzed by gender?

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What else are we missing?

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World War II changed a lot of things,

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and one of them was this need
to protect people

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from becoming victims of medical research
without informed consent.

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So some much-needed guidelines
or rules were set into place,

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and part of that was this desire
to protect women of childbearing age

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from entering into any
medical research studies.

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It was fear, what if something happened
to the fetus during this study?

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Who would be responsible.

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And so the scientists
at this time actually thought

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this was a blessing in disguise,

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because let's face it,

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men's bodies are pretty homogeneous.