Sex and illness

Sex and illness

A sex-specific illness is an illness that occurs only in people of one sex. There are other sex-related illnesses that are more common to one sex, or which manifest differently in each sex.

Neither concept should be confused with sexually transmitted disease, which is a completely different concept.

Sex-related illnesses have various causes:

sex-linked genetic illnesses
parts of the reproductive system that are specific to one sex
social causes that relate to the gender role expected of that sex in a particular society.
different levels of reporting or diagnosis in each gender.

Examples of sex-related illnesses in humans:

Men:

prostate cancer and other diseases of the male reproductive system only occur in men
certain genetic diseases, such as colour blindness, occur more frequently in men. They are caused by sex-linked, recessive genes carried on the non-homologous portion of the X chromosome.
Men are more likely to succeed in committing suicide, and women are more likely to attempt it.

Women:

99% of breast cancer occurs in women

Anorexia nervosa and bulimia affects females primarily

ovarian cancer, endometriosis, and other diseases of the female reproductive system only occur in women

More women than men suffer from Sj�gren's syndrome, scleroderma, and osteoporosis

in Western cultures, more women than men suffer from eating disorders such as anorexia and bulimia

Women are more likely to suffer from unipolar clinical depression (although bipolar disorder appears to affect both sexes equally)

Psychologists are more likely to diagnose women than men with borderline or histrionic personality disorder. There is no current agreement on whether this is because of a real underlying difference between the sexes, or simply because of deeply ingrained social attitudes.