Dr Robert Vickers (affectionately known as "Dr Bob" with his patients), is a well respected and passionate women's health GP based out of Singleton in NSW, and also online via telehealth at Clinic66Online.com.au.
In this short Q&A video for Women's Health Week, Dr Bob answers a couple of tricky questions around women's mental health, and discusses how really common misdiagnosis is making life so much harder for too many women. He answers:
Q. How does my mental health influence choice of contraception? Are some better than others? and
Q. How do I manage brain fog during my menstrual cycle and baby brain?
In the Words of Dr Bob:
"The question I’d really like to discuss is about anxiety and brain fog being undiagnosed ADHD. It’s really common for women to miss diagnosis at a younger age, as a neurotypical misogynistic society puts more pressure on girls/women to mask symptoms. The diagnostic criteria has classically been not as sensitive. "Many women struggle with chronic anxiety, executive dysfunction, and low moods, without getting a correct diagnosis. It usually gets worse postpartum, and is falsely labeled 'baby brain'. It also fluctuates with the menstrual cycle, and can be misdiagnosed as PMDD/PMS. "Many Combined Oral Contraceptive Pills can also worsen symptoms. The lack of memory and attention peaks at mid cycle, so rates of unplanned pregnancy are higher. Many of our teleabortion patients have either newly diagnosed ADHD or clearly have it but haven’t been assessed. Menopause can also worsen symptoms. The other common concern is mental health side effects of contraception. I frequently discuss with my patients, the factors of estrogen, progesterone, ovulatory/anovulatory contraception with respect to mental health."
Dr Robert Vickers
Aug, 2022
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