Pelvic exams on unconscious women

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:With all of the male hatred on DCUM, I feel very sorry for your sons, husbands, fathers, brothers, etc. Most men are not abusers.

No but men are men even as a Dr.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:With all of the male hatred on DCUM, I feel very sorry for your sons, husbands, fathers, brothers, etc. Most men are not abusers.

Perhaps, but do you know about risk analysis, or cost/benefit based decisions? Those who are perpetrators of violence against women are out there in great numbers. It is safer for females to there for control whatever they can and decline male providers. "Male hatred" is an exaggeration but it is based on real experiences. Don't get all offended about facts. Would you let your daughter go to the USC medical clinic? You think he is unique? No. He is not unique. He just was finally turned in.

Be careful. I certainly wouldn't let my daughter see a male if at all possible. But they are very smart, smile, act proffessional, and count on you being unaware or trusting.

Female physician who has seen many years of awful, slightly sub-criminal behavior.

Well Ms. Doctor did you do something or look the other way?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Unfoking believable. Outrageous. Are we living in a twilight zone? What kind of disrespectful evilness is this?! Taking advantage of unconscious patients? You better have a female chaperone in the room because there's no telling what one the creeps might do to you while you're unconscious? What.Is.This ??!??!

Good God, and we count on these animals to be the helping profession?

Yup. Never trust any hospital as a safe place. Or a doctor's office, for that matter. You enter their space at great risk.

As extreme as it sounds, I agree. I was sexually abused by two different doctors when I was younger and intimidated. My kids and family don't go to male doctors because of my experience and some things that have happened to other people. I don't trust doctors much anymore.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:With all of the male hatred on DCUM, I feel very sorry for your sons, husbands, fathers, brothers, etc. Most men are not abusers.

Perhaps, but do you know about risk analysis, or cost/benefit based decisions? Those who are perpetrators of violence against women are out there in great numbers. It is safer for females to there for control whatever they can and decline male providers. "Male hatred" is an exaggeration but it is based on real experiences. Don't get all offended about facts. Would you let your daughter go to the USC medical clinic? You think he is unique? No. He is not unique. He just was finally turned in.

Be careful. I certainly wouldn't let my daughter see a male if at all possible. But they are very smart, smile, act proffessional, and count on you being unaware or trusting.

Female physician who has seen many years of awful, slightly sub-criminal behavior.

Well Ms. Doctor did you do something or look the other way?

Well, Mr. Aggressively Confrontational, of course. But unless you are in medicine, you won't understand the hostile environment. It's a place where very bad behavior is par for the course, absolutely normal, and permitted. It's a thing, look it up.

However this is not the point of the OP. Med student/Dr. in training is doing a public service announcement: anesthetized females very often endure multiple pelvic exams by (4-7-ish) residents, students, etc, without their knowledge or "informed consent". This is part of traditional medical training in the academic medical environment. There is no clinical indication for these exams. The point is for the trainee to learn the anatomy.

Also, "whistleblowers" have their own problems to deal with. The hostility and abuse that follows questioning, much less correcting an attending physcian is nearly insurmountable, as a trainee. It's bad no matter which way it goes.

Bolsin, S., Pal, R., Wilmshurst, P., & Pena, M. (2011). Whistleblowing and patient safety: the patient's or the profession's interests at stake?. Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine, 104(7), 278-82. Retrieved from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3128871/#s2title

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It amazes me that anyone goes to a male ob gyn. Women are so naive.

My male OB with 30 years of experience is incredible in terms of bedside manner, knowledge, respect from his peers, and skill. I understand wanting a female as I only initially chose him because he was close and took my insurance. In hindsight, he is the best doctor I have ever seen.

I chose my now long retired OB/GYN to deliver my kids because he was a solo practitioner with a very, very low C-section rate. Huge amount of experience including combat, where they often prefer OB/GYNs because they know how to deal with profuse bleeding.

These things matter more to me than the sex of the doctor.

That's great you have a nice, competent doctor. As expected. This post is about unconcious women being subjected to pelvic exams.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:With all of the male hatred on DCUM, I feel very sorry for your sons, husbands, fathers, brothers, etc. Most men are not abusers.

No but men are men even as a Dr.

Too true.

[Anonymous]

Please make sure your sons (and daughters) are respectful of you, their parents, as well of siblings and other people.

The blatant disrespect of other people is learned in the nuclear family during childhood.

Whether our children become teachers, coaches, doctors, lawyers, clergy, executives, or whatever, don't we want them to respect other people who are less powerful?

I see lots of parents who seem to think it's cute when their child asserts him/herself, even when it's clearly disrespectful.
I'm afraid parents carry some responsibility for the problems we see today.

Please do not tolerate bad behavior, even if it's not your child. Do not be afraid to speak up. Bad behavior is not ok, and should not be ignored.

Obviously, once your child is an adult, s/he must bear full responsibility for his/her own behavior.

[Anonymous]

It seems like the definition of a pelvic exam involves some evaluation for diagnostic or treatment purposes. If it's not done for those reasons, isn't that the same thing as some creep in any other non-medical setting doing the same thing to a woman, which would be rape?

That man may also have an MD. And he might commit the crime in his medical practice office. And he might have her consent to preform another procedure or to drug her. What's to stop him from saying that he deemed it "necessary"? It seems to me to be the same thing. (In fact, didn't something similar happen recently with some sort of sports team, maybe gymnastics??)

Can anyone with a legal background explain the difference between a "pelvic exam" that is not performed for the reason of actually diagnosing or treating the patient and "rape"? Why are things not legally crimes if they're committed during business hours in a reputable medical institution? And that's even if the woman has previously consented to being examined at all by med students, which I'm sure the vast majority do/would not if they'd been explicitly asked and/or aware of what they were signing.

[Anonymous]

^ argh... I meant the vast majority would not do, if they'd been explicitly asked and aware.

[Anonymous]

In a hospital you sign away any sense of dignity and ownership of your own body. They keep you down at their mercy.

The worst is for healthy women going in just to deliver their babies. They often leave violated and traumatized, but they're told they're lucky their baby is alive.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm a 4th year med student (not OP). I have done pelvic exams on unconscious patients before gynecologic procedures. I thought they were consented for this as part of the procedure but maybe they were not. Even when I thought they were consented I wasn't super comfortable doing it to be completely honest. I did lots of pelvic exams on awake patients and felt fine about those but I didn't like doing it when they were under anesthesia. Also as someone said above, it is true that they pay fake patients (called standardized patients) for us to learn how to do our first pelvic exam. We do the same for the prostate exam.

OP here. Wondering if you can refuse? This literally makes me want to puke- it’s like being raped. What if there is damage to the women? This isn’t crazy as one med student really hurt a standardized patient by clamping on her cervix. I will literally drop out of med school if they make me do this.

I’m sure you could refuse. When I did pelvic exams on our anethesized patients the attending/resident was also doing the same thing before the procedure to know what the anatomy they were working with was like before the camera was in. They would usually do it themselves and then tell me to do it after them. I assume they were consented for a pelvic exam as part of the procedure but I don’t know if they knew multiple people would be doing it.

[Anonymous]

I have to have a LEEP done under anesthesia (hospital outpatient) in a few weeks and I am now terrified.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have to have a LEEP done under anesthesia (hospital outpatient) in a few weeks and I am now terrified.

Just take someone with you.

[Anonymous]

Why would any man want to become a gynecologist or obstetrician these days?

I mean isn't that just a little odd?
They have SO many other options for a specialty.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have to have a LEEP done under anesthesia (hospital outpatient) in a few weeks and I am now terrified.

Just take someone with you.

How would that help? they aren't allowed in the OR.