Women may wait 30 minutes longer than men for pain relief, study finds

Women seeking treatment for pain can wait 30 minutes longer in emergency departments than men, according to a recent study published in PNAS.

The study was conducted by researchers in the United States and Israel and assessed emergency department datasets from both countries. According to the study, which analyzed nearly 22,000 emergency department discharge notes of patients with a pain complaint, there are major disparities between the treatment of male and female patients.

A review of patient records in Israel found that women wait longer – up to 30 minutes more than men – for treatment. In addition, women in the United States and Israel were less likely than men to be prescribed the necessary pain-relief medications.

The disparity was consistent even after adjusting for other variables such as pain scores, ethnicity and age. The study also looked at the sex of prescribers and found that both male and female physicians prescribed less pain-relief medication to women. Nurses were also 10% less likely to record women’s pain scores upon admission to the emergency department.

As part of the study, the researchers also ran an experiment to test their hypothesis. They provided 109 nurses with anecdotes about patients’ pain and found that the nurses rated female patients’ pain as less intense than male patients.

“Our research reveals a troubling bias in how women’s pain is perceived and treated in emergency care settings,” author Shoham Choshen-Hillel said in a news release. “This undertreatment of female patients’ pain could have serious implications for women’s health outcomes, potentially leading to longer recovery times, complications, or chronic pain conditions.”