Aaron Hartman, MDFunctional Medicine Specialist | Clinical Researcher

Until 1993, Women Were Banned From Clinical Drug Trials — Then Those Drugs Were Prescribed t #shorts

23 Sept 2026 · 2 min

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1:32

In this short video, Dr. Aaron Hartman explains that until 1993 women were excluded from clinical drug trials because their hormonal cycles were deemed too complex, leading researchers to test drugs only on men and then prescribe them to women. He argues that this historical bias created a systemic blind spot that still causes women to be misdiagnosed, have their symptoms dismissed, and be gaslighted in modern healthcare. Dr. Hartman calls for a shift toward individualized, personalized care supported by modern science and AI, and invites viewers to share examples of current blind spots in the healthcare system where patients feel overlooked or misdiagnosed.

Chapters

In 1993, women were banned from clinical research trials. Why on earth would that happen? Well, women's hormonal fluctuations made research complicated, so they tested drugs on men and prescribed them to women. Think about that. Because women are complicated, which it's very complicated to actually bring life into this world. That's a very cool thing about women's physiology, but also makes it complicated. They were actually banned from research trials. So research on men, women were treated. This is one of the many reasons why women get overlooked in our healthcare system. It's a blind spot and actually can lead to gaslighting of women because their symptoms from medications being overlooked by, for the chest pain, abdominal pain. This is actually ingrained in our system to overlook complicated individuals to things that are more difficult to basically, you know, ignore it, put it to the side, and then create a Response, let's just study the simple people, men, and then apply it to everybody. That just does not work. In today's healthcare system, we need individualized, personalized care. With all the science, all the information, all the AI tools, we need to change the trajectory of our healthcare. But the reason I quote this information is that it's still going on today. So I'd love to hear a place you feel like is a blind spot in our current healthcare system. Is there something that's happened to you or a loved one where we were overlooked, you were misdiagnosed, You were brushed off. I've gone to this date over probably 40 different blind spots in our healthcare system over the last several months. Of course, I'm probably missing something. I want to know what my blind spot is. I'd love to hear from you what you think my blind spot might be. So share below and let's learn together.