Don’t Dismiss New Symptoms
It's Personal.
When my mom began feeling dizzy and depressed, it seemed easy to assume why. She has inclusion body myositis, a progressive muscle-wasting disease. Of course, she might feel down — living with a chronic condition is hard. But she had never been depressed before, and the timing was suspicious.
I did what I often do: I researched her medications. I’d already noticed her heart rate was unusually low, and when we mentioned it at a prior appointment, it was brushed off. This time, I pressed harder. I called her cardiologist’s office, spoke to the nurse, and was very specific about side effects. Based on what I’d found, I knew the likely culprit was her blood pressure medication, Bystolic.
That conversation reminded me of a lesson I’ve had to learn for myself, too: new symptoms should never just be written off as “aging” or “life being hard.” They can have a medical cause, and sometimes a simple adjustment makes all the difference.
Why We Need to Ask Questions
New dizziness, fatigue, or mood changes often get dismissed by patients and by doctors. Data show this kind of dismissal is a serious problem, especially for women:
93% of women report feeling dismissed when seeking medical help.
84% of women say they’ve had times when their healthcare professionals weren’t listening.
Women are 20–30% more likely than men to experience diagnostic errors in outpatient care.
In one study of prescription records, 12% of patients were given drug pairs that interact, and women had a 60% higher risk of being exposed to dangerous interactions.
Adverse drug reactions are among the leading causes of hospitalizations and deaths, even when medications are taken exactly as prescribed.
These numbers make clear: it’s not just in our heads. People — especially women — are dismissed, misdiagnosed, and often harmed by the very drugs meant to help them.
Advocate for Yourself (or Your Loved One)
It’s not only patients who assume symptoms are “just age” or “just stress.” Doctors can do it too, often without realizing. Again, women are more likely to have their complaints attributed to mood, menopause, or lifestyle. That’s why it’s so important to advocate for yourself.
Do your homework. You don’t need to be a doctor, but a quick review of your medications — or asking a trusted person in your life to do it with you — can help you spot possible side effects.
Get a medication review. You can request this from your care team or your pharmacist. Pharmacists, in particular, are trained to spot interactions and side effect patterns.
Track changes clearly. Ordering your medication history from your pharmacy can be more useful than digging through your medical chart. It lays out exactly when drugs were started, stopped, or doses changed. That timeline often holds the key to understanding new symptoms.
Ask directly: Could this symptom be a side effect of medication?
Push for assessment: Even if it’s “probably nothing,” you deserve a medical check.
Don’t accept dismissal: If a provider brushes you off, ask again or seek a second opinion if possible. If the dismissal is ongoing, find a new doctor.
Advocacy doesn’t always mean demanding an expensive workup. Sometimes it’s as simple as adjusting a dose, switching a medication, or ordering a lab. But you only get those adjustments if you speak up. In mom’s case, the nurse called back and told her to half her dose to see if she saw improvement. She’s keeping track of symptoms now so she can give good feedback and even ask for a further reduction if desired.
Build a Care Team That Talks to Each Other
Complex conditions rarely fit neatly into one specialist’s lane. Yet too often, cardiologists, neurologists, and primary care doctors operate in silos, leaving patients to connect the dots. Some of them, unfortunately, even feel quite defensive about what they consider to be their territory, even if a different specialist would better handle something.
One way forward: build a team of doctors who actually communicate. That’s what we’re working on for my mom. We will trust her new vascular neurologist to manage her stroke risk. Instead of guessing which cardiologist might be a good fit, we’re asking that neurologist to recommend a cardiologist they’ve worked with before — someone they trust to handle the heart issues while collaborating on the bigger picture.
This kind of intentional team-building helps prevent “single-number thinking,” such as chasing a perfect blood pressure reading at the expense of other essential factors, like sufficient oxygen delivery to organs and a general quality of life. Instead, the care team weighs the risks and trade-offs together, balancing factors such as stroke prevention, heart function, side effects, the risk of falls, and overall well-being.
Final Thoughts
New symptoms aren’t just “part of getting older.” They aren’t always “just stress.” You are not “hysterical” or a hypochondriac. Your symptoms deserve attention. Too many women, too many older adults, and too many patients with chronic illness are told to accept what could, in fact, be addressed.
Advocate for yourself. Bring new symptoms to your doctor. Ask if your symptoms could be side effects of a medication you are taking. Push for evaluation. And whenever possible, build a care team that collaborates rather than competes. Remember that different physicians bring different expertise: a cardiologist, for example, may not have the same specialized training in brain microvasculature as a vascular neurologist. Seeking out the right specialist when needed ensures you receive the most accurate diagnosis and treatment. You deserve the best care. You deserve to talk to the experts.
My mom’s dizziness and depression may turn out to be a medication issue. But as our call to the nurse shows, you don’t have to accept every new ache, mood change, or dizzy spell as inevitable. Sometimes, the answer is simple — but only if you ask.
Resources
NPR interview with Sharon Malone on women's health access issues, including some ideas on what individual women can do
50 examples of gender bias in healthcare, with supporting evidence
Harvard Health on what you can do to help prevent drug interactions
“All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.”
— J. R. R. Tolkien
We have a bookshop store HERE where you can find books Linda has read, or that look helpful for folks dealing with chronic diseases of various kinds.
This blog post is based on personal experiences and is not meant to provide medical advice.
Always consult your healthcare professional for personalized guidance on your health journey.
