You know how when you're overweight, you constantly feel like everyone's looking at you and judging you? Well apparently, your doctor really is.

A new Johns Hopkins research study found that doctors have lower respect for those patients who are deemed obese. Here is an excerpt from an article I read on it:

"The new study  to be published in the November edition of Journal of General Internal Medicine (http://www.wiley.com/bw/journal.asp?ref=0884-8734) found that physicians had lower respect for patients with a higher than normal Body Mass Index (BMI), the standard for determining healthy weight based on a person’s height and weight.

According to Mary Margaret Huizinga (http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/gim/faculty/Huizinga.html), assistant professor of general internal medicine at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, “Many patients (in the study) felt like because they were overweight, they weren’t receiving the type of care other patients received.” 

Well, those patients were apparently right. Furthermore, and most importantly, the patients who are not respected leave their doctors' offices with less information than they should have about their own health, which could be a factor in their long-term health.

The doctor in this article goes on to talk about what can be done about this situation, and that doctors should be trained in obesity discrimination.

Here is the rest of the article:

http://www.examiner.com/x-11566-SF-Fitness-Examiner~y2009m10d25-Does-your-doctor-respect-you-if-youre-fat

What do YOU think? Do doctors have less respect for those who are overweight?