Dutch doctors’ reluctance towards prescribing antibiotics might be a tale as old as time, but new research shows that some also refuse to take migrant patients seriously — all because of a harmful myth about their pain tolerance.
The harmful story goes that ‘migrants have a higher pain threshold’, and it’s just that — a story. But it’s not stopping some Dutch healthcare providers from treating them differently.
Research by the scientific journal BMJ Open proves that this isn’t just conjecture.
Investigating discrimination in Dutch healthcare, their study reveals shocking findings for migrants, as summarised by NU.nl.
Dutch denial
Investigating the prejudice of healthcare providers in the Netherlands is a challenge.
Associate professor of medicine at Amsterdam UMC, Jeanine Suurmond, discovered this when her attempts were repeatedly denied.
READ MORE | Going to a doctor in the Netherlands? Here’s the ultimate guide
Speaking to NU.nl, she explains that when it came to migrant discrimination, “I have sometimes been told that this would not be an issue in Dutch healthcare”.
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Then why does the new research show that over 25% of Dutch patients with a migrant background felt their health problems were dismissed because of their origin?
Risking patients’ health
So, this is bigger than just a few pain complaints being ignored, but a dangerous attitude problem.
“When healthcare providers do not take the complaints and pain of patients of colour seriously or have misconceptions about this, the patient does not receive fair care,” Charifa Zemouri, lead author of the BMJ Open article, tells NU.nl.
Working with expats has opened my eyes to Dutch healthcare being a dystopian bureaucracy.
— Rick Buitenman (@rickmb) August 17, 2019
scene: group of migrant engineers chatting
"I got my Dutch GP to prescribe me medication!"
"How did you manage to do that!"
*sounds of amazement, admiration, shock, laughter*
end scene
And it’s a common European bias, as studies across the continent show that “medical students are less likely to choose strong anaesthesia for people with a migration background”, Movisie researcher Hanneke Felten explains.
READ MORE | Why expats struggle with mental health in the Netherlands — and what you can do about it
So the evidence is already pretty damning — and then you hear the stories some migrants shared about their healthcare experiences.
The study puts forward a number of concerning case studies.
For example, one man tells of how his wife was initially accused of pretending to be in pain because, culturally, Caribbeans are considered more “dramatic.”
She was diagnosed with cancer after finally being taken seriously.
How did it get to this?
Receiving less pain relief because of your skin colour certainly sounds like something from the dark ages.
And sadly, that’s exactly where this prejudice comes from — the ‘higher pain threshold’ myth has its origins in the history of slavery, according to Zemouri and other experts.
READ MORE | About time: King Willem-Alexander apologises for the Netherlands’ role in slavery
The horrifying reality is that claiming non-white enslaved people could endure pain better than white people was a way for Dutch slave owners to justify brutal mistreatment.
Another contributing problem is medical consultancy centres spreading misinformation to healthcare providers, which informs the care they give.
NU.nl reached out to one such expertise provider, Pharos, about a false statement on their website claiming Moluccan and Indian elderly people “often have a high pain threshold”.
Pharos removed the passage shortly after their questions, but a lot of their information remains outdated. 👀
So, where do we go from here? Well, to enjoy a healthcare system without such prejudices, Zemouri encourages providers to “stop blaming health disparities on the patient and take action.”
Have you had similar problems with Dutch healthcare? Let us know in the comments below.
I just had a dental surgery. The surgeon said to me the anesthesia was not working, so instead of giving me more they hold me down and did the procedure anyway. Worst painful experience of my life.
It sounds familiar.
A GP told me once that “you (migrant) complain too much because you are used to a different healthcare system”. Yes sir, I have lived in several countries where patients are listened and not just dismissed as a cost-saving measure.
I personally don’t go to the GP to chat or see his/her face. I go when I need to and I want a solution.
I remember once when I was having bacteria throat infection, it took me 5 days to get antibiotics and only from different doctor in different place. My first GP said I should just “drink a lot of water to fight the fever, take some painkillers and go to work as soon as I’ll get better”.
I was only one step from calling ambulance but luckily one doctor took it seriously and applied proper treatment.
This is very familiar to my family and me! My wife had a problem, and it was causing pain. She checked that at home, and found out that she has a sickness X. However, our GP dismissed that my wife has sickness X and refused to prescribe the required antibiotics. Afterwards, we have visited the GP again, but the same has repeated. After several months, we visited our home country for vacation, and there the doctors confirmed that my wife had a very strong version of sickness X, and in fact her kidneys started accumulating stones because of it. She got some treatment in our home country during our entire vacation weeks. My wife finally felt some relief after enduring the pain for several months. After returning to NL, we told this to our GP, but they kept dismissing that she had sickness X.
I also had another health problem Y. This time, I managed to convince the GP to send me for a check-up. In the check-up, the assistant confirmed that I have sickness Y. However, the doctor insisted that the sickness Y is not really a danger to my health, thus it does not need to be treated. For a few years now, I have been living with the pain and the extreme discomfort of the sickness Y. I did not have the chance to do the microsurgery to treat this sickness in my home country yet, but whenever I have the chance, I will do it.