Older adults with severe mental illness challenge healthcare system

https://www.sciencedaily.com/release...1114122154.htm

i believe this may be due to the long term effects of daily trauma: social, financial, emotional and even physical, that affect people who are already marginalized by misperceptions of incompetency. we are unwilling to be seen as seeking help unnecessarily; often disrespected by doctors; have all our physical symptoms blamed on the MI; and generally given poorer quality care.

Makes sense, Gus.

Interesting to note that the last comment in the article was about the increased burden that this challenge placed on the healthcare system. Unfortunately I suspect this is most likely to lead to even more marginalization and perceptions of incompetency rather than investigation of what can be done to help.

I second that! The physical symptoms get blamed on the mental illness, and we don't get taken seriously leading to delays and misdiagnosis that can sometimes even kill us. Like a friend of mine, bless his sole, whose heart pain was blamed on anxiety, wrongly. It is so hard to get taken seriously and to not be stigmatized. I can only agree wholeheartedly with your views. It is always a battle for me to get help for a physical illness....with doctors and with my family who always think I'm mental. I could have died from an insect bite and cellulitis and severe gall stone disease and complications. My family thought I was just hysterical. Nothing could have been further from the truth. And, by the way, the gastroenterologist wanted to off me to pain management thinking it was all in my head. I really had to fight to get help. We are supposed to tell the truth to health care professionals and tell them what meds we are on, but the stigma in health care is there....after all doctors are human, too, and have stigmatized us along with the rest of society...it is truly unfortunate. Thank you for bringing this up.