A Glasgow man has said he decided to stay home after suffering a heart attack for fear that the doctors wouldn't 'believe him'.
The shocking revelation is included in Darren McGarvey's latest book examining the links between social deprivation and health problems.
The social commentator visited Possil during the writing of The Social Distance Between Us where the life expectancy for men is just 66 and 73 for women.
He details the story of a man named Andy who suffered his first health scare at 29 and has gone on to suffer four heart attacks since and is now 'restricted in his lifestyle'.
Andy shares a story about his fourth heart attack that he suffered at home. He told Darren that due to his 'relative experience of cardiac arrests and his disinterest in going to casualty' because he was convinced the doctors wouldn't believe him, he stayed at home until going to see his GP, who he trusted, in the morning.
The book also hears from GP, Dr Lynsay Crawford, who outlines that patients in the area told her that they didn't want to take measures to 'live a longer rubbish life'.
In an extract published online, Darren writes: "Sadly, Lynsay no longer works at the local practice. Due to the work-related stress and the effect on her home life, she moved on.
"After years of trying to communicate the impact of poor healthcare provision on both patients and the local practice, she became resigned to the fact nothing would change — much like her patients in the face of their ailments.
"What chance do communities like Possil have when resources are so scant that even doctors who love the areas in which they work, and understand them intimately, feel they have no choice but to practise medicine elsewhere or risk their own health and wellbeing?"
Dr Crawford adds that funding issues mean that doctors are less likely to work in deprived areas and locals might have to wait weeks for an appointment.
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She believes that there are disproportionate levels of funding granted to affluent communities that have fewer health problems.
Darren adds: "It’s in these conditions that some people simply stop contacting the doctor’s surgery and instead self-medicate at one of the numerous local pharmacies, where codeine-infused, highly addictive painkillers, sleeping medications and potent cough mixtures are advertised prominently in the windows and are readily available without prescription.
"It is also in these conditions that toothaches become abscesses requiring emergency surgery; aches and pains become chronic mobility issues; strange lumps, put quickly out of mind, become stage four cancers and mental health problems and addictions become drug deaths and suicides."
Read the full extract from The Social Distance Between Us here before the book is published in full on June 16.
