Melanie Avila, a first-year Criminal Justice Law Enforcement major, recalls an experience of being fat-shamed by her doctor when she was younger.
“When I was about 10 years old my doctor would call me overweight based on the BMI scale which is known to be flawed. He’d make very rude and smart comments about my weight every time I came in for a doctor’s visit,” Avila says.
This impacted her negatively and changed her view of going to the doctor.
She says, “Being exposed to those negative comments as a kid really harmed my perception of doctors. I hate going to get checkups and I absolutely hate the scale. It gives me really bad anxiety, I start sweating really hard and I get uncomfortable to the point of wanting to cry.”
Avila continues, “I would tweet about how bad my anxiety really gets when I’m told to go on the scale to really show people how bad the BMI scale can affect your life and the way you perceive yourself.”
This unfortunate reality is what many people around the world have gone through similar experiences of mistreatment from doctors like Avila.
Daisy Fung, a Family Physician and Assistant Clinical Professor, brought the hashtag #DiagnosisFat back from 2014 in November 2021, showing a screenshot of an original Reddit post from someone who was fat-shamed by a doctor.
The hashtag refers to the experiences of mostly women, whose health concerns weren’t taken seriously by doctors because they were overweight.
@MarisaKabas who tweeted under the #DiagnosisFat thread wrote, “I’m having surgery next week to remove a massive uterine fibroid that I self-diagnosed (from reading another woman’s missed fibroid story) after many, many years of doctors thinking my distended lower abdomen was just fat. Hard to explain the fury.”
@iainpaisley, another person who tweeted under the hashtag, wrote, “So many times I would be at the ER with my wife and I’d be jumping up and down waving my arms (metaphorically) saying ‘this isn’t right, this isn’t normal’ and because of my weight they would just be like, ‘yep that’s a bleeding belly button and oozing pus what do you want me to do about it?’”
The testimonies of those from #DiagnosisFat show the lack of sensitivity and the dismissal of pain from doctors toward obese patients who seek medical help. Being harassed to lose weight can be mentally scarring or even offensive, as Avila experienced.
Dr. Noah Schmuckler, Chief Physician, is a doctor from Riverside Urgent Care in Hamilton who shared the situations he’s seen frequently regarding weight bias.
“Patients will come to me and will say ‘I’ve had this pain for a long time and every time I see a doctor they say it’s just because you’re too fat,’” he explained.
According to NBCNews, a 2012 survey of almost 2,500 U.S. women found that 69% reported feeling stigmatized by their doctors and 52% endured recurring fat bias.
In surveys of primary care doctors, more than 50% report viewing patients who are obese as “awkward, unattractive, ugly and noncompliant.” Because of this, doctors tend to spend less time on obese patients.
Dr. Schmuckler says of weight bias, “The sad thing is that because there’s a grain of truth to that in that being overweight does make you more likely to have chronic pain for a variety of reasons, you’re missing an opportunity to find out what’s going on and really helping the patient get a better understanding of what’s causing their symptoms.”
Other Mercer students shared their similar experiences about going to the doctor’s office.
Brandon Rodriguez, a first-year Gaming Design major, says, “It wasn’t in a mean way, I was just constantly told to be aware of my weight because I reached certain stages of diabetes at a young age.”
Frances Kumagutu, a second-year Nursing major, says, “I was told by my doctor I should lose some weight due to my height and I thought I didn’t gain that much for her to tell me this. I was a little bit shocked abt that but I guess I have to be a certain weight that the doctor considers ok for me”
As weight bias continues to shadow doctor’s visits, patients become more reluctant to treat legitimate health concerns in fear they would be told they are just fat. Mercer’s Nursing Department staff shared their perspective on the situation.
Radhika Jaisihma, a Nursing Specialist at MCCC, says, “Weight is one of the big things because being obese can cause a lot of problems, but there are ways you can express it to a patient. Like, you can be in a positive way, like tell them these are the risk factors.”
Elizabeth Mizerek, Director of Nursing and Diversity Equity and Inclusion Committee member says, “I think it’s very important when dealing with anyone to ensure that we’re reviewing them as a whole person and not focusing on just one element of their experience.”
She adds, “There’s a lot of assumptions that tend to be made by all healthcare providers that the person who is morbidly obese is lazy.”
#DiagnosisFat revived the conversation surrounding weight bias and doctors’ assumptions about their patients based on their appearance, an experience many Mercer students and others around the world race.
Dr. Schmuckler says, “There’s an old saying: Honesty without compassion is brutality. A person who is overweight probably knows that they’re overweight, so you’re not really helping them by pointing it out.”
