(Health.com) -- It's shocking, but it's true: Being a woman who's more than 20 pounds overweight may actually hike your risk of getting poor medical treatment. In fact, weighing too much can have surprising -- and devastating -- health repercussions beyond the usual diabetes and heart-health concerns you've heard about for years.
Recent studies have found, if you are an overweight woman you:
• May have a harder time getting health insurance or have to pay higher premiums
• Are at higher risk of being misdiagnosed or receiving inaccurate dosages of drugs
• Are less likely to find a fertility doctor who will help you get pregnant
• Are less likely to have cancer detected early and get effective treatment for it
What's going on here? Fat discrimination is part of the problem. A recent Yale study suggested that weight bias can start when a woman is as little as 13 pounds over her highest healthy weight.
Our culture has enormous negativity toward overweight people, and doctors aren't immune.
