Patient Bias

[GURPS]

No, You Can't See a Different Doctor: We Need Zero Tolerance of Patient Bias​

It was 1970. I was in my second year of medical school. I had been up half the night preparing for a history and physical on a patient with aortic stenosis. When I arrived at the bedside, he refused to talk to me or allow me to examine him. He requested a "white doctor" instead. I can remember the hurt and embarrassment as if it were yesterday.

Coming from the Deep South, I was very familiar with racial bias, but I did not expect it at that level and in that environment. From that point on, I was anxious at each patient encounter, concerned that this might happen again. And it did several times during my residency and fellowship.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) defines workplace violence as "…any act or threat of physical violence, harassment, intimidation, or other threatening disruptive behavior that occurs at the work site. It ranges from threats and verbal abuse to physical assaults."

There is considerable media focus on incidents of physical violence against healthcare workers, but when patients, their families, or visitors openly display bias and request a different doctor, nurse, or technician for nonmedical reasons, the impact is profound. This is extremely hurtful to a professional who has worked long and hard to acquire skills and expertise. And, while speech may not constitute violence in the strictest sense of the word, there is growing evidence that it can be physically harmful through its effect on the nervous system, even if no physical contact is involved.

Incidents of bias occur regularly and are clearly on the rise. In most cases the request for a different healthcare worker is granted to honor the rights of the patient. The healthcare worker is left alone and emotionally wounded; the healthcare institutions are complicit.

This bias is mostly racial but can also be based on religion, sexual orientation, age, disability, body size, accent, or gender.



So Doctor, you want to FORCE someone who has a problem with your Ethnicity or Gender to be YOUR Patient ....
Why the hell would you want to work for someone who does not like you, for what ever reason ?

 

[spr1975wshs]

So Doctor, you want to FORCE someone who has a problem with your Ethnicity or Gender to be YOUR Patient ....
Why the hell would you want to work for someone who does not like you, for what ever reason ?

Freedom of Association, should subsume Freedom of Disassociation.

 

[vraiblonde]

Allll....lil whiny doctor got his feefees hurted.



Patients are customers and customers should be able to ask for and receive the caregiver they're most comfortable with. The end. If a black person didn't want a white doctor, should the white doctor have a toddler meltdown over it? Is the black person rejecting the white doctor "violence"?

(The answers are no, and no.)

It's the exact same as a woman wanting a woman doctor, which happens all the time, and male doctors don't cry about it.

 

[Hijinx]

I would like to have Doctor who speaks English, but today that is getting harder.

 

[Sneakers]

I would like to have Doctor who speaks English, but today that is getting harder.

As you get older, that's not as much of an issue.

 

[Kyle]

As you get older, that's not as much of an issue.

I don’t know… I prefer to be able to understand what they’re telling me.

In all fairness, I have had couple of foreign drs. Over the years for different maladies but my GP has been The same for decades. Local doctor down here from a family of local doctors down there.

Doesn’t beat around the bush or sugarcoat anything.

I just hope I can find someone similar when he retires shortly.

 

[Sneakers]

I don’t know… I prefer to be able to understand what they’re telling me.

That was my point.... the older you get, the less you can hear anyway.

Another poorly executed joke...

 

[Hijinx]

I suppose as you get older you remember the old days and wonder what is happening.
In the old days of my youth, you found a Doctor and he (mostly it was a he back then) and he would actually see you the day after you made an appointment. or maybe the same day. If you were hospitalized he would come to see you in the hospital and in fact he took a turn working in the emergency room.

Today if you can get an appointment with your primary in a week you are lucky. Now you need an appointment at urgent care. Your primary has your records, but they are not complete as your trips to urgent care or the emergency room are not there. If you go to the hospital you can forget you doctor coming there for you. Once you go there you get whatever the hospital sends in to see you. Why even have a so called primary?

 

[PeoplesElbow]

My grandfather made nurses at the hospital he was in cry, I witnessed him telling a doctor "You foreigners come here at least you could learn to speak English". The doctor actually spoke English pretty well, he couldn't hear a damn thing so assumed that he couldn't.

They got him well real fast and got him out of there.

 

[Hijinx]

My grandfather made nurses at the hospital he was in cry, I witnessed him telling a doctor "You foreigners come here at least you could learn to speak English". The doctor actually spoke English pretty well, he couldn't hear a damn thing so assumed that he couldn't.

They got him well real fast and got him out of there.

He probably had a star on the door of his room---------meaning he was a pain in the ass.

 

[PeoplesElbow]

He probably had a star on the door of his room---------meaning he was a pain in the ass.

Lol I didn't know that was a thing. I would have put the stars up for them because he was a colossal pain in the ass.

My aunt got on his ass and he actually apologized to the physical therapist, I about crap my pants when I heard he apologized.

 

[Merlin99]

I don’t know… I prefer to be able to understand what they’re telling me.

In all fairness, I have had couple of foreign drs. Over the years for different maladies but my GP has been The same for decades. Local doctor down here from a family of local doctors down there.

Doesn’t beat around the bush or sugarcoat anything.

I just hope I can find someone similar when he retires shortly.

I liked my old doc, I walked in the office and he said you’re fat, I told him he was ugly and I could diet. Some jokes never get old.

 

[3CATSAILOR]

No, You Can't See a Different Doctor: We Need Zero Tolerance of Patient Bias​

It was 1970. I was in my second year of medical school. I had been up half the night preparing for a history and physical on a patient with aortic stenosis. When I arrived at the bedside, he refused to talk to me or allow me to examine him. He requested a "white doctor" instead. I can remember the hurt and embarrassment as if it were yesterday.

Coming from the Deep South, I was very familiar with racial bias, but I did not expect it at that level and in that environment. From that point on, I was anxious at each patient encounter, concerned that this might happen again. And it did several times during my residency and fellowship.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) defines workplace violence as "…any act or threat of physical violence, harassment, intimidation, or other threatening disruptive behavior that occurs at the work site. It ranges from threats and verbal abuse to physical assaults."

There is considerable media focus on incidents of physical violence against healthcare workers, but when patients, their families, or visitors openly display bias and request a different doctor, nurse, or technician for nonmedical reasons, the impact is profound. This is extremely hurtful to a professional who has worked long and hard to acquire skills and expertise. And, while speech may not constitute violence in the strictest sense of the word, there is growing evidence that it can be physically harmful through its effect on the nervous system, even if no physical contact is involved.

Incidents of bias occur regularly and are clearly on the rise. In most cases the request for a different healthcare worker is granted to honor the rights of the patient. The healthcare worker is left alone and emotionally wounded; the healthcare institutions are complicit.

This bias is mostly racial but can also be based on religion, sexual orientation, age, disability, body size, accent, or gender.



So Doctor, you want to FORCE someone who has a problem with your Ethnicity or Gender to be YOUR Patient ....
Why the hell would you want to work for someone who does not like you, for what ever reason ?

In the Federal Government, I had a supervisor that was Bipolar and also had some level of Schizophrenia. In the Federal Government, they think it's normal. In the Postal Service when people are "mentally challenged", they call it "going postal". In reality, it isn't just the Postal Service. It is so bad, the Federal police trained monthly in the exact same Federal Building I worked in for a workplace shooter possibility. They are aware of some of the issues. But, they can't do anything about it until it happens. Of course by then, it's after the fact.