{"id":755941,"date":"2026-06-23T22:30:16","date_gmt":"2026-06-23T22:30:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/755941\/"},"modified":"2026-06-23T22:30:16","modified_gmt":"2026-06-23T22:30:16","slug":"medical-misogyny-in-australia-how-jenny-pipers-fight-for-answers-exposed-systemic-healthcare-failures","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/755941\/","title":{"rendered":"Medical misogyny in Australia: How Jenny Piper\u2019s fight for answers exposed systemic healthcare failures"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"EmilySave<\/p>\n

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It was standing room only at St Augustine\u2019s Church in Neutral Bay on Thursday as family and friends gathered to remember Jenny Piper, the woman whose story of medical misogyny resonated with tens of thousands of readers.<\/p>\n

Piper died of cancer on June 8 after years of her symptoms being dismissed as menopausal and a key finding on a CT scan was overlooked.<\/p>\n

At her funeral, she was remembered for her generosity, optimism and unwavering faith.<\/p>\n

\"JennyJenny Piper died just after her 60th birthday.Janie Barrett<\/p>\n

It was her Christian faith that sustained her after she was diagnosed with terminal cancer in 2024, almost a decade after she first reported her symptoms to a GP.<\/p>\n

Related Article\"Jenny<\/a><\/p>\n

Just a few days after her 60th birthday, Piper died in hospital surrounded by her family. <\/p>\n

Her husband, Bruce, and their three children, Sarah, Anna and Ben, each described Piper\u2019s life since her diagnosis as her own \u201cdeep valley\u201d, as in Psalm 23, a passage that she often returned to in her final months. Even as she walked through that valley of the shadow of death, she feared no evil. She was comforted.<\/p>\n

Amid the grief was an undercurrent of deep warmth for the woman who contained multitudes: a believer, bird-watcher, traveller, homebody, entrepreneur, friend, wife, mother and grandmother.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd such a lot of fun,\u201d Piper\u2019s family told this masthead.<\/p>\n

For Bruce and her children, Piper\u2019s death is still surreal, as if they were \u201cplayers in a movie that we are watching from afar\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cNone of us has really come to grips with the fact that she is gone.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe one thing she wanted to do was to die well,\u201d Bruce said through tears at the lectern of the church he and Piper attended every week. \u201cJenny, I think the outpouring of love and respect in recent days shows you did that to perfection.\u201d<\/p>\n

To readers of The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age, she will be remembered as an advocate for women whose pain has been dismissed.<\/p>\n

Piper was the first woman to publicly share her story in the course of the mastheads\u2019 \u201cmedical misogyny\u201d investigation<\/a>. She was among more than 2000 women who reported their experiences navigating gender bias in the Australian healthcare system. <\/p>\n

\"JennyJenny Piper\u2019s family during the funeral service at St Augustine\u2019s Church in Sydney.Photo: Janie Barrett<\/p>\n

Piper wanted her doctor to consider other causes and avenues of investigation for her inexplicable weight gain, her hair loss, paper-thin skin and fatigue. But she said her GP told her it was menopause and that she just needed to lose weight, assuming this was the cause of her complaints, not a symptom to be investigated.<\/p>\n

In June 2022, after an unrelated operation to treat varicose veins, a chance finding on a CT scan of a three-centimetre suspected adrenal adenoma \u2013 a type of benign tumour \u2013 was overlooked.<\/p>\n

By the time the tumour was discovered \u2013 after Piper herself found the old CT scan report \u2013 it had more than doubled in size and was cancerous.<\/p>\n

The tumour was removed in 2024, but the cancer returned 10 months later and had spread to her liver, lungs and spine. She was given months to live.<\/p>\n

Piper had Cushing\u2019s syndrome, a rare hormonal disorder caused by prolonged exposure to high levels of cortisol that are often due to tumours on the pituitary or adrenal glands that can become cancerous if left untreated, as happened in her case.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe biggest thing is, listen to your body and yourself,\u201d Piper said. \u201cYou know best.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"JennyJenny Piper\u2019s husband Bruce holds up the family crest she designed on a hankie.Photo: Janie Barrett<\/p>\n

This is why Piper first contacted our mastheads, her family said. \u201cShe wanted women to not be afraid to advocate for themselves.\u201d She succeeded.<\/p>\n

Related Article\"Penny<\/a><\/p>\n

Readers recall Piper\u2019s story more than a year after it was published in April 2025, telling our reporters that she prompted them to seek a second opinion, change doctors or speak up for themselves during medical consultations. They expressed their gratitude that Piper had done so and their admiration for how brave she was.<\/p>\n

\u201cJenny definitely didn\u2019t expect the reaction that came from the story. We felt it was so brave of her to put herself in the public eye,\u201d her family said. \u201cParticularly with a photo. She hated having pictures taken of herself.\u201d<\/p>\n

Scattered around the lectern were bird houses that Piper had collected, each filled with flower arrangements, representing two hobbies that brought her comfort as she traversed her deep valley.<\/p>\n

\"JennyJenny Piper\u2019s story empowered many women to take further action.Photo: Janie Barrett<\/p>\n

Piper had joked about organising the floral arrangements for her own funeral when she first met our reporters.<\/p>\n

She chose to stop aggressive treatment that may have helped to briefly extend her life but made her feel more unwell. She just wanted to soak up every last drop of time she had with her family.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne of the things that gives me great peace to know is \u2026 Mum was not afraid of death\u201d, her daughter, Anna Piper, said. \u201cShe knew where she was going.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is not the end of her story. The Lord was her shepherd, and now she\u2019s home.\u201d<\/p>\n

The \u201cmedical misogyny\u201d investigation is ongoing.<\/p>\n

\"JennyJenny Piper\u2019s bird houses at her memorial service. Late in life, Jenny developed a love for bird-watching.Photo: Janie Barrett<\/p>\n

Get the day\u2019s breaking news, entertainment ideas and a long read to enjoy. Sign up to receive our Evening Edition newsletter.<\/a><\/p>\n

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\"EmilyEmily Kaine<\/a> is a national news blogger at The Sydney Morning Herald.Connect via email<\/a>.From our partners<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Save You have reached your maximum number of saved items. Remove items from your saved list to add…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":755942,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[64,63,137,500],"class_list":["post-755941","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-healthcare","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-health","tag-healthcare"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/755941","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=755941"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/755941\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/755942"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=755941"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=755941"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=755941"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}