You went to the doctor and came out feeling worse
Health You went to the doctor and came out feeling worse “If we use the term ‘gaslighting’ when intent is absent, we’re missing the opportunity for compassion for providers,” says psychologist Alexandra Fuss.Photo by Dylan Goodman Alvin Powell Harvard Staff Writer March 7, 2025 5 min read Psychologist who studied ‘medical gaslighting’ explains how caseload pressures contribute to the problem and when we should call it something else Patients struggling with hard-to-detect conditions, such as long COVID, or with symptoms whose causes modern medical testing has trouble pinning down, such as irritable bowel syndrome, can feel dismissed when a doctor says they can’t find a cause for the ailment, or — worse — when they suggest that the condition may be all in the patient’s head. This is commonly known as “medical gaslighting,” a problem that is hardly new but which social media has amplified in recent years. Alexandra Fuss, director of behavioral medicine in inflammatory bowel disease at...