Gender differences in reporting pain

Will the treatment of pain eventually be tailored to a patient’s gender?

When I get a particularly nasty headache, I race for the ibuprofen bottle and down three 200-milligram tablets (a dose long ago approved by my doctor) and get on with whatever I was doing, comforted by the knowledge that I’ve taken action to dull the pain and that I will feel better soon. When my husband has a headache, he delays doing anything — including telling me, for whatever comfort that might bring — and succumbs to the ibuprofen (taking just two tablets) only when the pain is so severe he can’t do much else.

Prev
Next