Embarrassing…. Not for me! (Just spit out out!)
It takes a lot to make me blush. It’s not the same for my patients though. I never fully understand when they say:
“Sorry about this, it’s so embarrassing”
Rightly or wrongly I reply:
“No need to apologise, it’s not embarrassing for me!”
This patient embarrassment does however cause me problems on occasions, especially when patients regresses to using non-anatomical phrases that confuse me, and rather than making it less embarrassing for the patient, I find myself interrogating them further.
Now I’m not completely unaware of common slang, so if a patient reports “an itchy cock” rather than a “pruritic penis”, I’m not gonna call a vet!
However sometimes embarrassment is enhanced by a poor descriptions.
I sometimes do know what they mean…but have an urge to reply in a naïve manner….for example….
Blushing patient: I’ve got a problem downstairs, there’s a smell and sticky stuff…
So I’m tempted to say: So you’ve come to see me because the drainage in your basement is over flowing, you really should get a plumber out
or:
Patient: I’ve got a blockage in my back passage.
Max retorts: Ask the council to unblock it. (Could prove a very difficult conversation)
There are so many names for genitals I sometimes get confused between my anatomy books and children’s characters… From Enid Blyton’s Fanny, Dick to the Teletubbies….
Recently I have been subjected to a very confusing conversation where I had to push to understand the information I was being given. Enhancing the patients embarrassment more than if she’d just said what she meant in the first place.
You have an advantage over me….you know this is embarrassing already.
The lady advised me she had put tissue in her underwear to make it feel nice, but was worried some tissue might have got stuck inside her. I therefore assumed she was having some abnormal discharge and was putting tissue in her underwear to stop it getting (sorry, I know you don’t like the word…) “moist”. I asked about the discharge and why she wasn’t using a sanitary towel if she was having problems. She denied having any discharge. So I asked why she put tissue in her underwear again, and she said “so it feels nice”, I wondered if her underwear was irritating an inflamed labia and asked why it didn’t feel nice without tissue. Realising she was still confusing me, she pushed past her embarrassment and secret code and in a voice considerably louder than I think she planned, she yelled “I was masturbating”.
I, of course, stayed cool and proceeded with the consultation in the knowledge I actually knew what she was talking about!
Still not embarrassing for me.
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It shouldn't happen in health care 