Gender and pain – is it an issue?

Abstract

More and more differences in perioperative responses between the sexes in a wide range of areas are being reported in the literature. Many factors including age and co-morbidity are instinctively considered by the anaesthesiologist when considering peri-operative morbidity. The gender of the patient is emerging as a possible indicator of morbidity which needs to be addressed as more data on differences in cardiac physiology and anatomy, gender differences in pain perception, different outcomes following trauma haemorrhage and brain injury are being reported in the anaesthetic literature. Two of the areas that are particularly pertinent to the anaesthesiologist are gender differences in pain perception, and gender differences in the peri-operative presentation and management of ischaemic heart disease.