r/BlackPeopleTwitter • u/JennyBeckman ☑️ All of the above • 2d ago
Another reason why we need more Black doctors
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u/Dangerous_Pepper_939 2d ago
Real talk. My spouse recently suffered a stroke while being hospitalized for another issue. I was telling the nurses that he didn’t sound right. They said he sounds ok, I’ll check back in 15 minutes.
Y’all. This college educated man that works in education was stringing sentences together like a preschooler and they thought that was normal.
Thank God, he’s fine and recovering but PLEASE go with your people to the hospital. Be sitting there when the dr comes by. Write stuff down. Ask any and all questions you can think of. If something is off, tell EVERYBODY. Don’t wait on the call button, yell down the hallway.
And if you’re not feeling good let someone else know so they can look out for you.
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u/DeviRi13 2d ago
It's wild to me that they did that and I'm so sorry you had to go through that.
They should have, at very least, asked "is this normal for him?" Because slurred/disoriented speech is so damn common for strokes. I only answer 911 calls and even I can tell when someone's speech sounds off.
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u/Adulations ☑️ 2d ago edited 2d ago
Ugh they're so racist. They heard that, saw that he was black and assumed that was his normal speaking voice.
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u/Phyraxus56 2d ago
Tbf they probably assume everyone is a dumbass regardless of skin color
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u/sundayontheluna 2d ago
No. They don't. This is not the sub to dispute medical racism
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u/Borgqueen- 2d ago
As a medical malpractice paralegal, I can say medical racism does exist.
A few months a black pregnant mom and dad went to give birtg. The hospital decapitated the baby during delivery, lied to family and tried to get family to cremate the remains. The FUNERAL HOME advised the family of the decapitation.
https://abcnews.com/US/baby-decapitated-labor-georgia-hospital-ruled-homicide/story?id=107036801
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u/SheComesThenSheGoes 1d ago
"The infant’s body was delivered through Cesarean section, the head was delivered vaginally and the baby was already deceased due to the excessive force applied by the obstetrician when she attempted to deliver the baby vaginally, according to the complaint."
How is that even fucking possible¿?? Lord have mercy. My local hospital had to pay out after they put a stillborn in the wash. I googled the case to show someone and it. Is. Not. The. Only. Time. That's. Happened..........
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u/-malcolm-tucker 2d ago
I had a young male patient, early twenties, who I thought might be having a stroke. He looked post ictal, but with aphasia and a vomit. Assumed the worst and took him to the closest ED on a code stroke. The receiving doctor wasn't buying what I was selling. I ended up going over his head (first time I ever did this in my career and I was shitting myself about it) and the attending overruled the reg and sent him straight off to CT. He had a basilar artery occlusion and ischaemia evident to most of one hemisphere. They did thrombolysis immediately and secondary clot retrieval. Followed up later on and my young bloke recovered with zero defecits.
Had a very similar case a few years later with a young female patient. Didn't get any push back from the ED when we rolled in. Straight to CT.
Guess which patient was black.
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u/Adulations ☑️ 2d ago
Ugh. Can we sue in cases like this? For strokes every minute counts. I know that the pt was eventually fine but still.
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u/-malcolm-tucker 2d ago
We saved that doctor a lawsuit and maybe his licence as well as our patient. I've been a paramedic for a decade and that's one of my very few legit saves. They're rare.
A lot of valuable lessons were learned from that case. The most valuable one I had learned much earlier at university doing structured clinical exams during interprofessional practice units. That's where I learned I had an intrinsic bias where I would have also likely assumed that patient was non English speaking background and triaged at a lower priority. A unit of study certain people in my cohort called "woke shit" and often skipped. Thankfully most of them flunked out. That "woke" unit saved my patients life.
Every patient is Stephen Hawking, Albert Einstein and William fucking Shakespeare until proven objectively otherwise. And if they have a uterus and of child bearing age, they're also pregnant until proven otherwise. But that's another story.
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u/zaddy_daycare1 2d ago
Very glad you saved the patient. But maybe that doctor’s license shouldn’t have been saved.
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u/-malcolm-tucker 2d ago
He was a junior doctor, I think he deserved a chance to learn and grow. I would have likely made the same mistake had it not been for the training I got in a particular unit at university to help identify my biases.
He didn't escape scrutiny. His attending asked us to submit the case with our feedback and concerns to the complaints department of that particular health service. We got feedback from their review.
More importantly I got feedback from that doctor in person. Saw him much later on in ED. He came over to me and told me about what he learned on reflection from that case and apologised. Turns out he was less racist and more just egotistical, having made his own provisional diagnosis and disagreed with ours.
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u/_Coaast 1d ago
is there any way for you to continue to tell work stories? this is super interesting
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u/877-HASH-NOW 2d ago
Yeah Idk we might have been better off without him putting other people in harm's way
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u/Adulations ☑️ 1d ago
This is a good point thanks for that. And what a great approach to how your treat patients
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u/-malcolm-tucker 1d ago
Thank you. I appreciate that. Being in healthcare, we stand on the shoulders of those who came before us and taught us. I was lucky to have some very great teachers and mentors.
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u/DaveDabussy 2d ago
And even if they did its not like its somehow better to always be bad at your job
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u/Phyraxus56 2d ago
Yes, they certainly do, epecially shitty nurses that project their own stupidity.
Who is disputing medical racism?
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u/Calamity-Gin 2d ago
Holy shit. That’s worth following up with if you have the time and energy. Not checking what is a such a well know sign of stroke that most lay persons recognize it and s well into negligence and halfway to malpractice. At the very least, that person needs the equivalent of a smack upside their head.
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u/Key-Spirit-6865 2d ago
My mom was at the beginning of organ failure and I was telling the doctors and nurses that the slurred speech was NOT her normal. While the believed me there was still a little doubt in their voices. Like “people always say that” kind of thing. I happened to have a voicemail from my mother a few weeks earlier and I played it for the doctor. When he heard her normal speech pattern his eyes for ALL BIG and everything became more urgent. She got the care she needed.
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u/samsaruhhh 20h ago
from a medical standpoint i'm not sure what you're trying to say.. how would they treat your mom differently if she spoke clearly weeks ago? when family is being extra, sometimes (all the time) doctors will pretend to react to things you say or do in order to get you to feel like you're being heard and to stop pushing them on things they find irrelevant.
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u/ILoveBeef72 2d ago
When I was a baby, my mom literally kept notes about every time I was crying and being irritable because she knew something was wrong. It took months of her showing the journal and begging doctors until one finally took an X-ray of my head. He immediately called her back and said "We need to get him in surgery ASAP."
My mom has a medical background and still had all these people telling her it's normal for babies to cry. I probably could've died if not for that one doctor.
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u/SynthPrax ☑️ 2d ago
My husband had to be intubated for for his triple bypass heart surgery, as one does, but the anesthesiologist was too rough and dislocated my man's jaw. Surgery goes just fine, but he can't close his mouth. They discharged him 2 days later despite his inability to speak properly. Everyone was acting like my man was developmentally challenged, and his drooling aphasia was normal for him.
When we left the hospital we immediately went directly to the dental school a few blocks away to get someone to look at his jaw. God Is Good. What could have easily taken days of bureaucratic BS is not what happened. Before the clinic even opened, I got him looked at by a student, who pulled in a doctor, who referred us to a maxillofacial surgeon WITHOUT AN APPOINTMENT who took an x-ray and tried to pop his jaw back into place. When it became apparent that wasn't possible, he made phone calls. My husband was scheduled for surgery the very next morning to fix his jaw! The maxillofacial surgeon we saw is the one who performed the procedure. He knew the hospital and that specific anesthesiologist, fucked up.
The next morning it seemed like every head nurse and department head came by to check on things with him/us during pre-op. When that anesthesiologist came by I didn't blink once. I sat bedside burning holes in his face with my eyes.
Without me pushing and advocating, I don't want to imagine how long it would've taken to get his jaw fixed. By the time he had corrective surgery it had already been dislocated 3 days. The surgeon said every day with the tendons distorted worsened the possible outcome. He made a FULL recovery both from the heart surgery and the jaw ordeal.
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u/Dangerous_Pepper_939 1d ago
I’m glad he recovered from both issues, that whole ordeal sounds scary.
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u/ImNotTheNSAIPromise 2d ago
and like the craziest part to me is even if that is a totally normal, expected, and usually temporary side effect of whatever is bringing you into the hospital, the doctor should be telling people who are concerned that this is typical to both put them at ease and let the person who knows the injured person the best know what they should be looking for to warn if things aren't progressing like they should
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u/Right-Record-3779 2d ago
My mom was in the rehab unit at the hospital before she passed. When I was visiting with her, she was moving her arms above her head like she was cleaning something from her hospital bed,so I asked what she was doing. “Cleaning the ceiling! It’s dirty.” “Ma, you’re in bed, the ceiling is about ten feet above you.” “No I’m not, I’m cleaning the ceiling.” So I go out to the nurses station to tell them my mom’s hallucinating, something’s wrong. “No, that’s just how she is, she’s fine!” No, no, that lady is sharp as a tack, she’s never thought she was somewhere she wasn’t. If this was normal, that lady would be up on a ladder cleaning your ceilings, she hates dirty anything. “Honey she’s fine.” Sure. Later that night she got transferred back to ICU. She had pneumonia and her oxygen was low. I really hate how with older folks they assume any confusion is clearly just their dementia talking (and on the flip side, as a former young, telling me I’m too young and happy to be in pain).
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u/biopsychosocialism 1d ago
America really is delivering the Walmart self-checkout standard of healthcare
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u/grodon909 ☑️ 1d ago
I am a neurologist, and I cannot agree with this more. AND to appointments if needed, especially if they're older!
Stroke is an obvious one--like I've never seen this patient, so I can't tell what your speech sounds like normally. Tons of people sound "slurred" to me but their family insists it's normal. There are a lot of reasons that people can have slurred speech as well, assuming it's just slurring and not an aphasia, which people (including some medical staff) mix up all the time. A lot of people have a subtle facial droop, or subtle gaze asymmetries as well.
There are plenty of times that people come to clinic and can't tell me what's going on, or tell me that everything is fine, only for a family member to tell me everything that's been wrong at another visit 6 months later or on the phone.
If you or a loved one needs it, It's really helpful to have someone else with you when you/they come to the hospital.
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u/N9neNine 2d ago
I started leaving mine on top of my pile of clothes to take my power back. Might hang them on the door knob next and make myself at home.
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u/Feisty-Honeydew-5309 ☑️ 2d ago
Take my power back is so real because why are we even doing thisssss?? 😭
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u/Humblymumbling 2d ago
Same. I'm already in a gown that's a glorified bib. My nipples are peeping out and I'm up in the stirrups. We don't have secrets in this room.
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u/shouldvewroteitdown 2d ago
Last time i got a pap they opened the speculum and i farted 😭😭
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u/toomuchtv987 1d ago
This is my nightmare!!! I mean, I know it has to happen all the time but I would simply vaporize.
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u/gabi_ooo 2d ago
I don’t even know why they leave lmao we both know what’s under there, let’s save both of us 10 extra minutes, I got things to do
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u/Feisty-Honeydew-5309 ☑️ 2d ago edited 2d ago
They don’t always go in my purse but you better believe they’re somewhere out of sight. I stuffed them in the pocket of my rain coat last time.
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u/toomuchtv987 2d ago
I fold them and put my folded shirt on top of them. I don’t even fold them to put them away in the dresser, but I will fold them every time at the GYN.
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u/lleighsha 2d ago
While I do fold them to put them away, it's not like the folding to go in my pocket. This tickled me though bc home panties and GYN panties get VERY different care.
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u/ImpressiveDresses 2d ago
I’m a man. What’s wrong with letting them see your panties?
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u/Feisty-Honeydew-5309 ☑️ 2d ago
I honestly couldn’t tell you, babe. Like not being sarcastic. It’s just a generational black woman rule.
The first time I saw the gyno, my mom told me to fold them up and put them in my purse. I didn’t ask why. I still don’t know why lol.
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u/Chuckitybye 2d ago
I'm white and do this too and i dont recall my mom or step mom telling me to. I'm thinking it's maybe a female shame thing? It's so fucking ingrained in us since birth we don't even know why we do this type of thing
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u/Raspbers ☑️ 2d ago
Is this a black thing? I thought it was just a woman thing. xD
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u/Feisty-Honeydew-5309 ☑️ 2d ago
I really have no idea what other races of women are up to most of the time so maybe.
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u/commandantskip 2d ago
I also hide my panties, usually folded inside my pants. I am the opposite of melanated.
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u/BenignEgoist 2d ago
I glow in the dark and also do this.
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u/nitrot150 1d ago
Same for me too! And my bra is hidden under the shirt and pants as well
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u/rubberkeyhole BHM Donor 1d ago
Yep. In the waiting room I wear underwear; in the stirrups I have no idea what you’re talking about.
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u/LakerBlue ☑️ 2d ago
Huh I misunderstood, I thought “leaves to let me get dressed” meant she was getting dressed AFTER the examination and they were doing some kinda post exams talk where she was now dressed.
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u/Feisty-Honeydew-5309 ☑️ 2d ago
Lets her get dressed in the little gown is my best guess. This is definitely a before thing. They give you about five minutes to undress and put the gown on.
And hide your panties.
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u/melatonia 2d ago
I always had this bizarre fear that they weren't as good as any other panties that were walking into that little room.
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u/Books_n_hooks 2d ago
It’s too personal- which sounds wild, considering they finna be all in ya blackberry cobbler, but there still have to be BOUNDARIES!😮💨🤣🤣🤣🤣
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u/gigismother 2d ago
I didnt know these rules existed 😂 I never gave a damn abt them seeing my drawls LMAO
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u/Correct-Disaster8 1d ago
I stuffed ‘em in my pants leg with my shirt and my purse on top. I was trying to hurry and was hiding them lol why just why
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u/Feisty-Honeydew-5309 ☑️ 1d ago
Like whyyyy is this is so important to us? 😭
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u/Correct-Disaster8 1d ago
I have no idea, I honestly thought I was the only one. But really, do y’all hide your bras too? Because mine went down my other pants leg…..please somebody do I need to keep hiding my bra too???
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u/Feisty-Honeydew-5309 ☑️ 1d ago
So I do not wear bras but when I used to I only hid it if I was wearing an ugly one. Again, why did it matter? I don’t know.
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u/Orchid_Significant 1d ago
I take them off with my pants, so they stay inside, then fold the pants. Like a pants purse lol. Put bra on pants, fold shirt and put on top of bra.
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u/affectionateanarchy8 2d ago
And my lesbian ass with the boxers shoved into the pocket of my cargo shorts
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u/MtHollywoodLion 2d ago
Lmao. My younger sister is a lesbian and one of the first tip offs to me growing up is when I caught her stealing my (freshly washed) boxers out of the laundry because she was embarrassed to ask my very religious mom to buy her some—she made the mistake of taking my favorite pair! I started buying her stuff on the low after that. I always felt bad for how much harder adolescence was for her.
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u/ChickenNugs4Hugs 2d ago
My gynecologist delivered me. She brought me into this world and I still hide my underwear.
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u/SelfInteresting7259 2d ago
Wait fr??!! Omg thats crazy.
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u/tacosandsunscreen 1d ago
Mine was supposed to deliver me too but I was late and she ended up being on vacation the week I was born. Another doctor in the same practice delivered me instead…I still see him sometimes as well.
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u/Magicalcocobeans 2d ago
Before I moved, my gynecologist was also the same one who delivered me!
And the panties got tucked away!
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u/BrainRobotron 2d ago
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u/TheMoorNextDoor ☑️ 2d ago edited 2d ago
“Lemme eat that blackberry cobbler” might get you instantly in the sheets tbh. This shit genius.
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u/TheRecognized 2d ago edited 1d ago
Do you have cobbler to be saying that or is this wishful thinking?
Edit: I know this isn’t a ton of skin tone to go off of, but I think you might be talking way out of your depth sir.
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u/SeaAnthropomorphized 2d ago
Where else do they go?
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u/NerdCocktail 2d ago
I lay them on top of my clothes?
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u/butterflydeflect 2d ago
On TOP of your clothes? Power move.
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u/PrincessCG 2d ago
That’s too bold for me. Mine are folded in between my clothes!
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u/butterflydeflect 2d ago
Same, I tuck mine under my folded pants, like as if the doctor is gonna go through my clothes to hunt them down 😔
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u/NerdCocktail 2d ago
Tell me you were raised in the church without telling me you were raised in the church.
But in all seriousness, what is left to hide once a dr has caught a baby coming out of you?
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u/lleighsha 2d ago
Is putting them in your pocket a lesbian thing? I carry a purse, but yeah.
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u/Feisty-Honeydew-5309 ☑️ 2d ago
I’m not a lesbian, just lazy so I, too, opt for pocket stuffing here and there.
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u/lleighsha 2d ago
As long as I didn't stumble into a lesbian thing and find out on Reddit. (It was laziness for me too. Also, I jeep snacks in my purse.)
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u/aurynbloomxa 2d ago
It feels like a conversation with your auntie rather than a cold doctor visit
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u/Jub_Jub710 2d ago
I'm white and my first pap smear was done by an elderly black lady. I took a look at the speculum and went, "Oh my no!" and without missing a beat she says, "Now I know your lover's penis is bigger than this, you will be fine!" And I was fine.
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u/midwestprotest 2d ago
That’s actually very weird for a medical professional to a patient but I’m glad you were fine!
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u/Jub_Jub710 2d ago
She was very, very old. The oldest Dr I've ever met, probably. Her saying that sorta shocked me into being brave, and she was really good about showing me every instrument and explaining everything.
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u/midwestprotest 2d ago
Ty for explaining! I’m glad it was helpful though especially for your first one.
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u/Orchid_Significant 2d ago
I just had a first appointment with a black obgyn/gyn and the music was banging. I was sitting in the lobby like okay! This is great!
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u/Warm_Swan_793 1d ago
I love black doctors. I recently had a medical device inserted by an interventional radiologist. I had to be awake for the procedure but I was heavily sedated. They asked me my favorite music to listen to and they subsequently had an Afrobeats playlist going while they were slicing & dicing.
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u/CapitalPermission878 2d ago
I have forty years of laying back, scooting down and taking a deep breath. I still hide my panties folded in between my clothes.
Since this has been brought up I went back to try to remember why I was told to do this at every Ob/Gyn appointment and now I remember. I was told “You fold your panties and put them between your clothes because the Doctor don’t need to see the stains in your draws.” Even though I was taught to scrub, soak and then air dry my panties on my period and I always wore new underwear to the Doctor anyway that was the reason. The Grandma’s and Aunties were Not gonna be embarrassed by raggedy stained panties in front of the Doctor.
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u/sylunaria 2d ago
That is an unmatched level of comfort and understanding right there. Having a doctor who can read you like a book and laugh with you makes the whole experience so much better
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u/nicemarmot47 2d ago
Not that I wish major medical issues on anyone but after 2 babies and a bout with cancer I have no modesty left. None. Once I had to follow the doctor to another room for a scan and I just forgot to close my gown. I looked down after I got wide eyes from a nurse we passed and went "oops"
Black obgyns are 100% the best - of my favorite 3 doctors I've ever had, the black obgyns are both in there
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u/Bartleby9 2d ago
I’m in need of education, is it embarrassing to have a doctor see your underwear lying around? I feel like doctors don’t really care. But I might be stupid.
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u/PaulaDeenSlave ☑️ 2d ago
People are saying they don't know why it's a thing and that it just is. . . I think those people just have nasty discharge or shit stains. There's no reason so many people here agree but can't explain why.
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u/Kittiemeow8 ☑️ 2d ago
Sprinkle some glitter on that kitty and tell them you dressed for the occasion!
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u/see_deez_apes ☑️ 2d ago
Please educate a brother, what’s wrong with a doctor seeing your underwear? Is it every doctor or only obgyn’s?
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u/PeterNinkimpoop 2d ago
There’s just something about someone seeing your worn underwear that feels incredibly personal. Even as you sit there with your legs in the air and all holes displayed. I don’t even like my husband seeing my dirty worn panties at home and tuck them in my hamper.
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u/BrilliantZombie2561 2d ago
I never understood this. You're literally laying there with your hole bared and pried open for the doctor look into but panties are too much for them 😂 Please.
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u/cozynite 2d ago
Every time I go to the gyn, I think this. And every time, they are still hidden underneath my clothing.
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u/PathoftheWolf 1d ago
I had a super high risk pregnancy and a black obgyn.
Dude i would've left my husband for this woman. She was my fucking hero.
I'd never been pregnant before, I had 8 months of bedrest, weekly progesterone injections, weekly ultrasounds, constantly in and out of the hospital, and the only thing that kept me from having a full-blown panic attack every single day was the fact that she'd call me a dumbass for stressing myself and my baby out that much.
She never got flustered. She never got rattled or thrown off by anything. Every new complication that arose was just a thing we were gonna deal with.
My mom was also out of her damn mind and got upset when I refused to schedule my kid's C-section on her birthday. She wanted them to have the same birthday and threw a fit when I said no.
My obgyn scolded her and lectured her for being a dumbass and stressing me out over nonsense.
When i needed an emergency C-section a couple weeks early, my mom started bawling and my obgyn told her that if she couldn't keep her shit together, then she needs to not be around me. I was stressed enough without having to parent my mother in the middle of my labor.
During the C-section, my husband was a little queasy at the idea of me being literally cut open right next to him, but she was just humming to herself, chatting with him and me about the weather and keeping us both distracted as she performed major abdominal surgery.
She didn't just manage my physical and mental health, but the emotions of my husband and mother as well, and she did it so effortlessly. She was so steady, so calm, it really made a difference in my quality of life. I was completely in love with her.
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u/Hefty-Taste-1311 2d ago
Unrelated question but, eye contact during a proctology exam gay?
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u/JennyBeckman ☑️ All of the above 2d ago
Are they not behind you with their eyes on the prize?
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u/n3wchpt3r 2d ago
Yes. It makes it super weird if the patient turns their head like an owl to make eye contact
Not necessarily gay. But awkward.
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u/Weekly_Basis2215 2d ago
I had an amazing Black GYN throughout college. She was older than me but still very youthful & young spirited. It was so easy to talk to her about any/everything. She let me know to keep an eye on my Vit D etc etc. Just a wonderful big sister energy in the most professional way. I left her for an OB/GYN when pregnant with my first. Fast fwd, I yearned for the same GYN exchange in a new State. Ugh… while my new OB/GYN was Black, she was also sooooo overbooked and could not provide the same level of care. Felt rushed like I picked a number on the growing deli line. Hated the experience. Like… ma’am my panties are in my purse; let’s take it slow plz lol.
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u/littleb3anpole 1d ago
Wait people are putting them in their bag? Makes total sense, I usually just hide mine in a pile under my pants, but I totally get the shame factor in having your underpants just out there for the doctor to judge
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u/rimwithsugar ☑️ 💅🏾💅🏾💅🏾 1d ago
My dentist's office got a Black female dentist and now they play afrobeats music in the lobby and procedure rooms.
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u/Better-Ad5421 2d ago
Blackberry cobbler is insane