McManimen, Stephanie, McClellan, Damani, Stoothoff, Jamie et al. · Health care for women international · 2019 · DOI
This study looked at why some ME/CFS patients feel dismissed by their doctors. Researchers asked patients online to describe negative experiences with healthcare providers and found common themes in how they were treated. The study highlights that many doctors don't have proper training about ME/CFS, which leads to unhelpful advice like exercising more or seeing a psychiatrist, and suggests ways the healthcare system can better support these patients.
Understanding healthcare barriers is critical for ME/CFS patients, as physician dismissal contributes to psychological harm and delays appropriate care. This study documents a systemic gap in medical training and provides evidence for the need to improve physician education and attitudes toward this marginalized patient population.
This study does not establish causation between physician attitudes and specific health outcomes, nor does it measure the prevalence of dismissive care across all healthcare settings. It cannot determine whether improved physician training directly improves patient outcomes, as it only captures self-reported experiences without clinical outcome data.
About the PEM badge: “PEM required” means post-exertional malaise was an explicit required diagnostic criterion for participant inclusion in this study — not that PEM was studied, observed, or discussed. Studies using criteria that do not require PEM (e.g. Fukuda, Oxford) are tagged “PEM not required”. How the atlas works →
The first block is for the primary paper and is the citation you should use in research work. The atlas-snapshot line only applies if you are specifically referring to this atlas’s reading of the paper on the date shown.
Primary citation
McManimen, Stephanie, McClellan, Damani, Stoothoff, Jamie, Gleason, Kristen, & Jason, Leonard A (2019). Dismissing chronic illness: A qualitative analysis of negative health care experiences.. Health care for women international. https://doi.org/10.1080/07399332.2018.1521811
BibTeX
@article{mecfsatlas-mcmanimen-2019-dismissing-chronic,
author = {McManimen, Stephanie and McClellan, Damani and Stoothoff, Jamie and Gleason, Kristen and Jason, Leonard A},
title = {Dismissing chronic illness: A qualitative analysis of negative health care experiences.},
journal = {Health care for women international},
year = {2019},
doi = {10.1080/07399332.2018.1521811},
note = {PubMed: 30829147},
url = {https://www.mecfsatlas.com/evidence/mcmanimen-2019-dismissing-chronic},
}Atlas snapshot reference
ME/CFS Atlas. Generator v1 / Scanner v1.4 / policy v0.1. Accessed 2026-05-27. https://www.mecfsatlas.com/evidence/mcmanimen-2019-dismissing-chronic
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