9 tips for advocating for your health needs – and Erin’s heartbreaking story

Grace explores nine practical, expert-backed tips to help women and gender-diverse people advocate for themselves in a medical system that often doesn’t listen. From “fire your doctor” to “understand your patient rights” — these tried-and-tested practical strategies could make all the difference. Plus: Grace hears how Erin, who lives with Hashimoto’s disease, kept advocating for herself in a medical system that didn’t seem to be listening — even after her pregnancy ended in tragedy. CONTENT WARNING: This episode contains descriptions of stillbirth, birth trauma, and medical trauma. Guests: Dr Pav Nanayakkara, a gynaecologist working at Jean Hailes for Women's Health and operating at Epworth Freemasons in Melbourne Dr Jane Hutchens, a researcher at the Insight Research Institute at the University of Technology Sydney Erin, who has Hashimoto’s disease and tragically lost her unborn son following abnormalities in her pregnancy bloodwork that, she says, weren’t thoroughly investigated Dr Alex Dunn, who saw four GPs before being diagnosed with a cancerous kidney tumour  Resources for this episode: “Women wait for endometriosis diagnosis with multiple symptoms,” Dr Dereje Gete  et al, 2023. “Large-scale characterization of gender differences in diagnosis prevalence and time to diagnosis,” Tony Yue Sun, 2023. Australian Charter of Healthcare Rights, 2008 (updated in 2019). “Is self-advocacy universally achievable for patients? The experiences of Australian women with cardiac disease in pregnancy and postpartum,” Dr Jane Hutchens et al, 2023.