Biker53

The bottom line is medical care does not automatically cause all patients to shed their modesty and to the extent they can be accommodated in those instances it is a good thing. Given the vast gender imbalance in nursing this is usually easy to do for female patients. More male nurses are needed, especially in areas such as urology, so as to accommodate male patients. More would seek the care they need if that were the case.

Most nursing and related care is not life or death scenarios. Passing medicine and providing most other services are not what is at issue here. It is intimate care that some women only want female staff for and that some men only want male staff for. It is a very small piece of the staffing picture. Just because you are comfortable with patient intimate exposure doesn't mean that the patient is automatically comfortable with it. Being in a hospital or medical office setting does not somehow erase social mores that govern every other aspect of a patient's life. I will add that while most healthcare staff act in a professional and purely clinical manner, the exceptions that don't can poison the well so to speak for patients that have had bad experiences.

I haven't walked in your shoes and suffered your embarrassment or discomfort and I suspect you've not had a female nurse make what was supposed to be a purely clinical encounter into something not entirely clinical. You've earned your anger at being rejected and I've earned my right to ask for male staff.

No, what's pathetic are healthcare staff that don't care how embarrassed or uncomfortable their patients are when forced to have certain exams or procedures done by opposite gender staff. Male patients bear most of the brunt of that kind of thinking given how easily female patients are accommodated in most situations. More male nurses and other non-physician staff are needed.

In an ideal world nobody would care but it's not an ideal world. Some patients do care. Some women don't want male staff for certain intimate procedures. Some men don't want women for certain intimate procedures. Thus having a mix of male & female staff is better than not. It's not just about the comfort and qualifications of the staff treating both men and women.

I'm 66 and can't swallow pills. Never could. The gag reflex kicks in. I generally use a finger to push them down my throat just far enough to swallow. Occasionally I just chew them.

I'm just asking questions trying to understand. I don't have the answer but agree that there is surely a skills & training reason why hospitals hire anesthesiologist MD's. It may what we are dealing with in this debate is the same as primary care NP's claiming they are the equivalent of internal medicine MD's. There is no way an MD goes through medical school and then years of residency and only has the equivalent education and skills of an NP who these days may never have even worked a day in their life as an RN but rather did one of those fast track online programs.

But you haven't answered why would a hospital ever hire an anesthesiologist if a CRNA will do the same work for much less $ while having the same skill & knowledge base as an anesthesiologist.

Then why would any hospital ever employ an Anesthesiologist MD if the same skill & knowledge level is available for far less $ in the form of CRNA's? Why would anyone go through all those years of medical school and Residency to become an Anesthesiologist if they can be easily replaced with a CRNA? These are real questions. I'm not trying to advocate for or against CRNA's or anesthesiologists. I'm just trying to understand the issue.

Interesting comment. This sounds like my experience with PA's. My last 2 primary care providers have been PA's, not because I wanted a PA but because when I needed to find a new PCP there weren't any MD's within 2 hours of where I live taking new patients. My reluctance/disappointment in not finding an MD quickly turned into a pleasant surprise. Both PA's (the 1st relocated which is how I came to have a 2nd) were by far more thorough in their assessments and attentive to medical issues than any MD I've had ever was. Both addressed issues that my prior MD's ignored. With CRNA's however, there is an act of faith that the CRNA will recognize when it is time to get the anesthesiologist and that the anesthesiologist is readily at hand.

This is a topic that has confused me or a while now. Am I understanding this correctly that the MD's are there for the initial induction but then leave for another OR while the CRNA stays with the patient and manages the anesthesia throughout the surgery, only calling the MD if an emergency arises? If so, how quickly do those MD's respond when called? Is it clear as to when the MD must be called? Seems somewhat fraudulent on the MD's part to talk to the patient as if they are the one making sure the patient gets through surgery safely when in fact it is the CRNA.

Elvish, you did it the way I would hope all parents would handle it. You gave your son a choice, and he chose what he was comfortable with. Our daughter was very shy and my wife just knew moving her to a female NP was the way to go. Our son was also shy and though he stayed with the male pediatrician he was still pretty embarrassed on account the doctor had a female in the room assisting during a physical I brought him to. Puberty can be a tough time for kids.

I don't fault the NP's who are doing their job as best they can while trying to minimize the embarrassment of their teenage boy patients, but I am at a loss as to what their parents are thinking in sending them to have such an exam by women. Do they not realize how embarrassing it is for these boys, embarrassment that would be greatly lessened if they sent the boys to a male provider for physicals post-puberty? My kids had a male pediatrician but when our daughter hit puberty we switched her over to a female NP for her physicals and routine care so as to spare her the embarrassment of being examined by a man during those sensitive years. It astounds me that parents don't think of their son's embarrassment.

From Julius Seizure I realize some young folks can be mature beyond their years and that there are some older folks that never grew up. It is just that generally speaking I find myself more comfortable with nurses that are say 40 or above. It has nothing to do with perceived competence but rather just accumulated life experience that gives them a different kind of ability to relate to patients. Just one person's perspective. My apologies to any of the young nurses here who might have taken offense. None was intended. And before anyone takes offense at me linking age 40 with "older", I can only wish I were that young again. LOL

For what its worth, as a patient I prefer older nurses. They have an emotional maturity that not all twenty somethings have.

I understand and apologize if I have intruded where I am not wanted. I had seen many non-nurses make posts and thought patient perspectives were welcome.

No, I am not a nurse but I have been in dozens of intimate care scenarios with nursing staff, enough so as to know the difference between being treated respectfully with no unnecessary exposure and on the other extreme having been treated so badly for it to have been a humiliating experience. Over the past 10 years or so I have seen great progress towards treating male patients with respect and am encouraged by that. I saw a reference on another blog about allnurses.com and came over to get a look see. I have learned a lot by reading some of the threads here and now better understand some of the realities nurses must contend with. I've also been encouraged by comments from nurses that do their best to protect patient physical privacy and on occasion been dismayed to see some nurses still don't get it. All I can do is offer an occasional patient perspective for those who are interested in how patients see things. Please accept my apologies for not having properly introduced myself earlier.

No doubt that is how many patients, male and female, handle it when they are being needlessly exposed to people who are not part of directly providing healthcare and for whom the patient was not asked permission for them to be there. Obviously a pelvic exam is as about as exposed as it gets. Personally I am agreeable to allowing students in the room being I understand it is a necessary part of how healthcare workers and professionals learn. I do expect to be asked first however and told exactly what they are (there is big range going from high school kids shadowing on up to residents) , and most importantly that I not have more exposure than is required. For example, students observing my colonoscopy do not need to have a view of my front side, and so I am OK with them being there so long as my front side is covered up. When I had bladder cancer surgery there were 5 medical students present (4 female, one male) and obviously it was my front side that was exposed. That was necessary exposure and so I agreed to them being there. There is a huge difference between being exposed in that manner than being unnecessarily exposed for what amounts to a spectator sport. The "we're all professionals here" mantra means nothing to me when I'm the only naked one in the room. Chaperones and scribes are another matter in that they are not there as part of their training but rather for the convenience & protection of the doctor. I fully understand why the doctor wants them there but it is within the doctor's purview as to whether they bring in male or female chaperones and scribes. Just as women generally want female chaperones and scribes during intimate exams and procedures, I expect the same courtesy with them being male. If the doctor won't do that, then I won't agree to their presence. I'm not the one who decided to only hire women in that practice. Having been necessarily exposed far more than most (dozens of catheterizations for example), I am not overly modest anymore. My issue is that I expect to be treated with respect and that means no more exposure than is needed or than I agree to (student presence). And I similarly fully support women who want privacy during pelvic exams or any other intimate exposure.

Sorry, I just haven't ever been to Randolph enough to be familiar with it. And I must say thank you for being a VNA & H nurse. They indeed do have a special calling. They helped me get through a couple family situations in years past that might have been overwhelming without their help. Most of us just don't know what to do when a loved one is dying.

Though I live closer to Randolph than I do Brattleboro, I am not familiar with it. Sorry. I used to live near Brattleboro and spent a lot of time there which is why I am familiar with it. Good luck to you. Every part of VT has its own appeal if you ask me.

Sailornurse, you hadn't commented further and I'm thinking maybe you really are serious that you would do a sports physical including a genital exam on a teenage boy with a female chaperone and Mom there watching. I was thinking you'd come back and say Mom would be asked to leave the room and that the boy would be shielded from the chaperone seeing his genitalia. It isn't his fault that his family perhaps can't afford to go to their own doctor or that his parents choose not to do so, or that Mom is so clueless that she doesn't speak up on his behalf. He is likely so terrified when he realizes what is about to happen that he won't speak up. Men are from Mars, women are from Venus. Silence is often how embarrassed/humiliated males react in this kind of situation. It is singular events like this that cause some men to subsequently avoid health care when they become adults. They may act macho with the "I don't need to go to the doctor" routine but the reality is often that they are afraid doing so will be a repeat of some prior event in which they were needlessly embarrassed and treated as if their modesty didn't matter.

I can't speak to the VNA & Hospice but I can tell you that Brattleboro is a great town. The downtown is fully walkable to wherever you want to go, lots of arts, restaurants & entertainment and some innovative kind of events such as the Gallery Walk the 1st Friday of each month, the Annual Strolling of the Heifers event, and so on. Brattleboro offers a generally a good quality of life.

Maevish, the vast majority of nurses would never take such a photo, and in this case it was co-workers who did the right thing and turned her in. Hopefully the administrators applauded their doing so. All nurses need to stand up to the rogue ones who violate patient privacy in whatever form it takes.

I agree, assuming the agency lets the patients know beforehand that the nurses would be bringing an assistant with them. And by that I mean making it clear rather than being buried in the fine print somewhere. It otherwise could make for an awkward situation if the patient was expecting just the nurse and the nurse shows up with the assistant.