I live a rather insular life, haunted by my PhD. So, the highlight of my week, this week, was going for my 3 monthly contact lense check. Anyway, it was really traumatic. The lady optometrist was new and she did stuff to me that I swear must constitute assault. She rolled my eyelids right, right back and then with this little eye torch thing came really, really close to my face. So close, in fact, that it felt like she was trying to make one of those romantic passes at me. I'm not over exaggerating because I can tell you exactly what she had for dinner - tuna and cucumber butties. Then she tried to sell me glasses. I don't like saying no, so I had to agree to a new appointment to try out their exclusive new range. Personally, I feel that glasses will stereotype me as being someone who is supposed to be intelligent.
I'm a 'health professional' and I believed that my occupation is the scariest one of the lot. Followed a close second by nurses after one of them, when drawing a blood sample, said to me, 'Oh, you've got beautiful veins..' When she pulled the needle out, blood just dribbled down my arm and into my palm - makes me queasy just remembering it.
So, I wonder if anyone else can forward suggestions of who they think is the scariest type of health professional? Have you had any encounters that have led you to think this is so? I reckon a lot of people will say dentist. I'd disagree though because, even though I don't have one at the moment, every time I went in the past it was a really enjoyable experience. That pink stuff you spit out when he's/she's finished inside your mouth tastes really nice and I quite liked the sensation of that scraping thing round the back of my teeth.

Afraid I'd nominate the obvious dentist. I've had quite a few over the years, and some of them were positively terrifying. And after the number of fillings and extractions I've had I'd find it hard to think of another scarier health professional.

Though as a female student a nurse about to do a smear test is rather terrifying ... Mmm!

I must admit I've always been lucky to have good dentists!

My scariest would have to be a psychiatrist I once saw. And I thought *I* was mad...

hmm my dentist is fine - he's a jolly south african, although I suspect he's a teency bit racist.

Have to second the evil smear nurse!

Although I think my scariest is my spinal consultant - who is the spitting image of Mario, but fatter. He brought in 12 other consultants to umm and arr over my bizarre MRI which showed I'm a very rare freak of nature. They talked above my head and he decided he was going to put me in for a laminectomy (this all happened in about 1 min) - then I piped up and admitted that I'd been reading about a new operation in BMJ which was very promising,(wanted to avoid laminectomy like mad) at which point he said "fine, we'll do that then" and I was pushed out of the office. Had to return 3 months later to have my spine sliced up and lots of scrap metal put in instead. He also came on rounds after the operation and forced me to get up and out of bed to walk around 4 hours after the MAJOR SPINAL SURGERY and then boasted to his students it was because of his good work - PAH!

Without a doubt, it has to be psychiatrists! I have the pleasure of seeing them as a patient (for the bipolar) and also working with them for my PhD, which is in mental health. I have met a lot of psychiatrists and I have to say, the majority have been absolute tossers! There are of course exceptions, but most of the ones I have encountered are power hungry, reluctant to consider any point of view except their own, completely inflexible, condescending, and arrogant to boot. The good ones I have come across seem to be those who have experienced mental ill health themselves- I did have one fantastic shrink who had had two nervous breakdowns and he was wonderful! But as for the rest...grrrrrrrr! I am going to stop here before I post a very long rant lol! Have a good weekend all! KB

Can I nominate another one? Sneaks's spinal consultant has reminded me of the totally incompetent hospital doctor who performed my lumbar puncture 13 years ago. It took 15 minutes of very painful probing with a very long needle to find the right spot. He commented "I'm not having a good day". I struggled not to swear back! And I screamed out loud. At least I got home that night, but I had deep bruising which painkillers wouldn't touch and lasted for many weeks.

But luckily his kind seems to be rare. He was just utterly incompetent.

It has to be my GP. I accidentally had a prolonged contact with Methanol thinking it to be a paint stripper. It absorbs through skin and even a few mls could be lethal. I had vomiting for 2 days with sleeplessness and extreme dizziness. I managed to book an appointment on the third day and he straight away he shown me an exterior trajectory by saying 'it is OK many people in third world country even use it as a replacement for beer'. It never been to a GP since then and it is five years now. I am my own doc now using a fuzzy rule based software programmed with help of my doc bro and imported drugs. I really hate GPs now and in extreme circumstances will go straight to hospital.

======= Date Modified 21 May 2010 23:30:30 =======
======= Date Modified 21 May 2010 23:29:14 =======
For me, it was one of the ophthalmologists while in my teens. Not my regular one, he’s pretty cool and sensible, but I was assigned to this other guy because my case was a different and a very rare one in youngsters and apparently this guy was supposed to be specialized in it. Yeah right! Initially, he kept refusing to enter the room to examine me because he claimed he had a cold and didn’t want to pass it on to me then after insisting that cold or not, I wanted to be examined; he came in grumpily with my regular ophthalmologist and thrust some cards with numbers on it at me to read. He asked me to bring it as close as I possibly could to my eyes while being able to read it and  at that point ,he exclaimed at me to stop and jumping up measured the distance between the card and my eye with his hand(!!!) and then turned around to my ophthalmologist yelling “bring the ruler quick to measure the distance” and he was so agitated while shouting out these instructions and looking around that to my horror I saw that he had moved quite farther and had not even kept his hand stationary so that by the time, he measured the distance with the ruler, he’d moved so much that the distance he measured was totally wrong and I was asked to wear some ridiculously high number! Despite my protests, the guy made me try on that number and when I complained that I couldn’t see a thing and was getting a headache and everything was looking four times as large and not able to focus at all, he declared that I had to wear them no matter what whether I could see or not (!) and that I‘d eventually get used to it!!! I always made sure that guy wasn’t around whenever I went to my ophthalmologist after that. That was like one of the most traumatic experiences I’ve ever had and although I am a health care professional myself, I always shudder when I have to go to one. There was this other one, a cardiologist but I am not going to go into that because the way he examined me would also constitute as assault and it was just plain disgusting. I really hate going for check-ups now and always try to avoid going at all costs although it’s not always possible because I suffer from a wide range of medical problems.

Have a star for being brave, Starlight. It really does seem like eye professionals are quite a scary bunch. Funny because my mate's sister is an opthamologist and I lent her my printer, because the one she had broke down, so she could get her dissertation in on time and qualify. It seems I have inadvertently perpetuated evil. I've trawled my memory and I can't think of anything to top your experiences, Sneaks' or Bilbo's. Not surprised about Danb's comment though because I've read Dice Man (which I'd like to direct as a movie if I don't get my unemployed PhD students' circus off the ground, and they're all mainly nutters - with a few exceptions.

I think some mental health professionals can be very scary indeed. I ran a film interst group for a mental health centre once, it was just supposed to be a nice evening out and a chat about a film we all like, but this weird woman who ran the centre insisted on showing films about mental health issues every week, and a couple of the 'service users' were triggered quite traumatically. It was awful, and this woman was so weird and controlling about it; then she tried to bond with me about reading the sunday papers, bizzare...


Also, the classic denstist. I had one recently who wouldn't believe me that I was in pain when she was drilling my tooth, and she actually pushed me back into the chair when she was giving me a filling, and I did lie their in total panic and some pain before walloping my arm out to get her off. However, after I'd jumped up and down a lot and stood outside I went back to get the fiiling finished and at that monent when they say bite down hard, I did so really, really hard, despite biting through what I thought was a bit of cotton wool, and really grinding on it; which was actually her finger. She screamed and yelped as I bit down really hard, not realisng. I had a real problem with dentists for a while, but my new dentist is fine, she's lovely.

======= Date Modified 22 May 2010 13:54:27 =======
OMG, I am so excited on receiving a star 8-)! Thanks a lot, Wally(up)!
Just recalled another two incidents (not for the sake of another star ;-),  I actually just remembered it) where a nurse had injected me in the rear and she did it so harshly that I ended up with severe pain for almost a whole year and although this sounds absurd, it's true. I even went to the GP for this and the only plausible explanation she could come up with was that, the injection might have hit my bone as I am so slim and hence the pain. The second incident was not only really traumatic but also life threatening; I was being given glucose IV once and the nurse adjusted it in such a way that the rate was twice as fast. My mom who was with me at the time expressed her concern that the rate seemed to be quite rapid but the nurse dismissed her concerns and left. Well the IV finished in 30 minutes and around that time, my chest started constricting really badly and it was hurting like crazy and I started shivering, choking, coughing and gasping for breath. My mom just ran out of the room yelling for some doctor to come and a few doctors and nurses came rushing in and demanding what was happening and on seeing my condition, I was immediately put on oxygen for around half an hour after which I was taken for a chest x-ray to determine whether I had developed pneumonia because of all this. Thankfully I hadn't, but I was so drained and exhausted after this life threatening experience, both physically as well as mentally that I had to leave the hospital on a wheelchair. Ironically, I had entered the hospital walking but left it on a wheelchair!
Oh and by the way, the doctors confirmed my mom's suspicion; the IV infusion rate was indeed quite rapid which caused this reaction.

I've been pretty lucky in not needing to see many scary health professionals (though my orthodontist in my teens did inflict a lot of pain on my mouth - but that was worth it for straight teeth)

I was gonna say Psychiatrists but notice a few people have said tht one. I had the misfortune of being interveiwed for a job once by a psychiatrist and that was bl**dy scary (didn't get the job either!)

However this year I discovered the joy of the sports massage. You have to lie there while someone inflicts a huge amount of pain or your legs (in my case) You know it's gonna help, you've chosen to be there, but while there you just want to scream and never run again (so you never need another massage!)

My dentist is certainly not scary, in fact he is incredibly attractive and one just sits in the chair melting ;)

My orthodontist was a perfectionist and was a "no pain no gain" sort of fellow, but after 4 years the teeth were straight.

I had a corneal ulcer once and required urgent eye treatment, the specialist consultant said that I had a particularly unusual case (age, position etc) and whilst I sat there in agony called in some medical students to gawp through a microscope! :(

======= Date Modified 22 May 2010 18:18:50 =======
======= Date Modified 22 May 2010 18:16:57 =======
My ex-partner cut the tendon in her little finger and that was near the top end. Although it was damaged but she could do everything what is needed. They did 4 operations and repaired the tendon. Believe me, she cannot even bend that finger anymore and is like a swan neck. The consultant left the job to two trainee doctors(becoming specialists) who needed experience. We even rescued our dad in 1999 undergoing a kidney removal procedure due to cancer. We found out that the kidney was in perfect form a few years later. Thanks to my cousin brother who arrived just in time and did not agree with their diagnostics.