Doctor Loses Pants

OBNURSE81

He loved delivering babies as well as caring for the old. Most of his deliveries were smooth, quiet, and usually uneventful (except for the expected event of having a wonderful newborn, of course).

Where the other physicians changed to a clear gel for cervical exams he still liked to use the reddish-brown Betadine gel. One day, he opened his sterile gloves and placed the package at the patient's feet. I opened the gel and applied it to his fingertips, then put the gel package on the empty glove wrapper so I could assist him with the exam. He was having a little trouble reaching the cervix so he sat down on the foot of the bed...right on the Betadine gel package.

When he was finished with the exam I followed him out into the hall and told him he had a big brown spot on the back of his pants from sitting on the gel. He took out his white hankie and began to wipe aimlessly. Finally, he said, "Oh - - - -, I can't see it." He handed me his hankie and turned around and said, "You do it."

Red-faced and hoping no one would notice, I managed to get the worst of it off. He kindly thanked me then said he was going home to change his pants before someone accused him of having a different sort of accident.

Dr. Kindly-to-patients-but-gruff-to-nurses was the attending physician when I delivered my first baby. I was a fairly new nurse and was still a little nervous around him. In those days, I didn't joke around with physicians much, they were way up on that pedestal and joking wasn't done, in my book. I, of course, would have been too reserved in those days anyway.

The patient's husband was an old high school classmate of mine. I knew he was a German Baptist, but in high school, he looked like all the rest of us. I hadn't seen him in years and now, when he brought his wife in for their fourth baby, he wore black, as the adult men in his religion do, with a wide-brimmed black hat, big bushy beard and had gained about 50 pounds. There wasn't time to reflect on that as the baby was coming fast. This was in the days before we had birthing rooms. I sent the aide to call the doctor while I hurriedly rushed him and his wife to the delivery room.

This elderly doctor could make it to the hospital in the middle of the night in record time, partially because he didn't worry about dressing completely. He would arrive in scrub pants and an undershirt. Regardless, on this occasion, the doctor didn't make it in time and I delivered the baby.

As the doctor arrived my ex-classmate, whom I always thought of as shy and quiet shouted jovially, "You missed the whole thing! We've got everything under control; you might as well go on back to the field." I caught my breath and tried to think of a way to smooth things over when the doctor, to my relief, just laughed.

Laughing was something I hadn't seen him so much. He was always serious and had the deadpan look down pat. I worked OB for years before I could tell when he was worried about something because his expressions never changed much. He never got very excited about anything, not even the night he lost his scrub pants in the middle of a delivery.

On this occasion, he came in and put on his sterile gown, mask, cap, and gloves. The patient was pushing and getting close to delivering when it happened. My co-worker couldn't believe her eyes when she saw the man's pants fall down around his ankles. He said, "Oh - - - -, just take 'em off." She pulled them off his feet and he stood there delivering a baby with his skinny bare legs, nylon socks and surgical booties showing beneath his sterile gown. But that wasn't half as funny as when the delivery was all over and he stood talking to the patient and her husband. Forgetting he didn't have any pants on, jerked off the sterile gown and there he stood in his underwear.

Doctor Loses Pants

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