I am a "very pleasant lady"

[HauntedBungalow]

... according to the consultant who wrote to my GP following an appointment. It says so on the first line of the letter.

I was feeling quite chuffed about this but when I told my cynical piss taking 21 yo son he said it probably meant I was a bit dozy. Surely not!

Does anyone know if "very pleasant lady" means fragrant and nice, or if it means thick?

I've obviously disinherited the son, regardless. (Not so dozy now am I? Twat.)

Just the technical term for over 35 (in pregnancy terms at least), nothing to get upset about.

I was described as young the first time I saw my current surgeon (I was 46). I raised my eyebrow at him (he dictated in front of you), and he laughed and said I was younger than him!

Well looking is code for overweight in consultant speak. I've read many a medical report which says this!

Be thankful you've been addressed as a pleasant lady in correspondence between doctors.

Don't overthink it, specially if the specialist is a great doctor, Yes, it is and misogynistic and patronising but often is colloquial language saying you will listen to advice.

Yes because those two are the same. A law abiding and successful woman with different political views to you should be likened to a serial murderer of children.

Also yes maybe you are fairly dozy if you didn’t realise that doctors write this all the time in referrals and it’s not because you’re especially pleasant.

This is bizarre to me (not in UK, not British). It sounds so odd to write personal descriptions like ”pleasant lady”. Is it only when they refer you somewhere else?

Although I remember now a colleague who told us about the note in her medical journal when she had burn-out and had been crying in the doctor’s office - something like ”well-kempt , somewhat unstable but no signs of suicidal tendencies” and we thought that was funny 😂

We asked our GP about consultants’ letter and he admitted that there is a code that is used ‘pleasant lady’ or ‘delightful’ etc but he wouldn’t give us the key to the code.

Well it is 2024...

@Rocknrollstar its code for 'standard patient, no outstanding observations, no reason to think this person will be a problem'.If the code is absent, they know the person could be challenging.

See also: well developed, well nourished. People think this is code for overweight, but it isn't, it means no sign of anomalies in physical development, no visual signs of malnutrition.

my first referral letter I was described as anxious aka in my view we are referring her to ultrasound to shut her up and then we can move on

second letter after my ultrasound when in fact it wasn’t just a swollen lymph gland I was described as delightful

It can mean a horrible patient too but usually it doesn’t.

I don’t do it, I write to GP’s and start “Thank you for referring Mrs X to X department” which is more neutral. Also in a 50min appt how am I supposed to know what they’re like. They could go home and be an awful person.

Good grief, it is the most common statement on a doctor's letter

'Dear x, thank you for referring this delightful/pleasant youg/old lady or young/old man to us. On examination, we found...'

Every consultant, every referral pretty much, and pretty much every time.

I was once described as a 'pleasant woman of average build'. I actually hated that as it reduced me to a sentence that seemed so boring. Especially as I was only 8 stone at the time and looked really skinny. I certainly didn't think I was average build and went away thinking I needed to lose weight.

I work in health care and write similar letters. I don't particularly use pleasant.

There isn't some sort of universal code. Yes historically I'm sure some places used to use things like nfn normal for Norfolk but it's never been anywhere I've worked in the last 30 years. Lots of them are urban myths or would be talked about but never actually used.

In someways it's tricky where people have access to everything that there isn't always a private space to discuss things and in my service the consultants letter is the only record of that interaction for example in my experience well informed normally means knows their condition, don't waste your appointment causing frustration by explaining basic concepts they've already googled or know well from living with it!

Equally some stuff will always dent your relationship so while in my field we absolutely have to assess self care and how people look, people see it on letters and can withdraw from the service if not done delicately

Some of it gets misunderstood eg denied does often mean they've been asked specifically about it

I've never heard of the thing around complained of meaning no symptoms. We certainly don't use it in that way

VERY pleasant does agree mean that the consultant thought you were pleasant and agreeable .

If the consultant described you as pleasant it means polite/ normal .

I’m a newer consultant and I write “ It was a pleasure to see you in the clinic today” ie this is a normal / nice patient or “We met in the clinic today” a pain in the arse. I occasionally write . “It was an Absolute pleasure to meet you . I then talk about how sprightly the elderly person is / or the marriage of 50 years or another personal detail to remind d myself that the person involved is absolutely fabulous and that I want to go the extra mile for them.

Well if Ms Hindley was pleasant to the consultant and staff during visit, yes.
They don't make value judgement based on someone's job or circumstance because their job is to treat all people regardless.

Otherwise you's be getting letters such as
Dear Doctor Smith
Why the fuck did you refer this scummy muderer to my clinic last week? Or
Thank you for referring this unplesant, moody and ungrateful woman to my clinic.

Without being rude, why did you think average build meant you needed to lose weight? It sounds like due to something underlying that you wanted to be underweight and I'm not sure that's strictly down to being called average weight

Do consultants and Drs etc get 'taught' to use such language, or do they pick it up on the job I wonder? Maybe they attend a lecture or module at University on how to use correct coded language?!

Yes. It’s very dated and condescending though. More recently trained doctors don’t do it. It’s not their job to decide on whether I’m pleasant or not. The really modern doctors write directly to the individual whose health they are describing and copy in the professionals.

I usually get pleasant or some variation of it on all consultant letters, but yesterday I received a copy that said "thank you for sending this lady to see me". I was honestly offended 😂

If DH identifies as a very pleasant lady who are we to disagree 😬

Not at all. I'm 5 ft 1 so 8 stone was fine, not underweight. It was just a surprise as nobody in my life had ever called me an average size. People always called me small or tiny. It made me question my perception of myself and wonder if I had been wrong all along, that I wasn't actually small at all but an average weight.

Wow.

So you make judgements on a person’s personality and worth based on your experience of them (bearing in mind people will be coming to you in varying states of anxiety and stress, may have been treated badly and traumatised by health care professionals in the past, may have several other stressful things going on in their life) and then have a code to remind yourself whether or not to to give them the best version of your care or the basic version.

If I knew who you were I would report you.

Oh and it's nice I am a lovely lady or I would have replied more rudely. I'm sorry you feel the need to be mean to strangers who have done nothing to you, and I said I have mentioned my ( tiny ) acreage) many times so wasn't doing it to look rich. What I payed for my place would pay for a 1 bed flat in my nearest capital city, (only 2 hours away) maybe with parking. Sorry for the rehash but I found that comment unnecessary . Oh and you probs won't find the threads about my animals as they for some reason became part of my son getting engaged threads. A few people were nasty on those two. It's all a bit sad that women ( and MN mostly is ) seem to jump at an opportunity to correct or mock or be disdainful. Sorry I'm sad today ( not due to sons) so have become stupidly upset by a silly persons comment on an internet forum. Not to self - stop doing that. Ignore, ignore, ignore.

I normally have "pleasant" but one tie I had "intelligent".
This meant I had corrected the doctor on something., and explained it thoroughly to them.
TBF it's something that's fairly rare so I would expect to know more than the GP.

DD once had "entertaining young lady". This was when she'd spoken to a doctor on the phone about a painful neck, and been told to come right down asap.
Turned out the doctor had asked"can you move the fingers on your left hand?"
DD answered "no".

She doesn't have a left hand.
Luckily the doctor found it funny. I was less impressed; she knew full well that wasn't a fair answer.

Absolutely this is how it should be done. You can’t judge someone’s whole personality from even a few meetings.

If there is aggressive behaviour then that needs describing and a boundary put in.

I also think it's difficult because when things are "normal" they have to be remarked upon which seems odd at times and a bit jarring by it's self. It shows they've been considered or assessed.

Sometimes the opposite makes more sense

Eg if I comment that someone seems well dressed, appropriately kept wearing make up it seems odd

However it tells me if If in their next appointment they suddenly look completely different it's a sign something has changed.

Appropriately dressed for example. If in the next appointment you are dressed differently it's a warning sign. I don't care about people's choice of fashion but for example in dementia care its common that people forget to change clothes, or do things like layering new clothes on top of old. In mental health changes in clothing can be a sign of people struggling, or even mania. We often look at if it's appropriate for the time of year for example, which seems odd but sometimes people with dementia lose ability to notice that they are wearing a big coat in the height of summer.

It means I've scanned for those sorts of signs and found none.

Same with normal speech, or normal eye contact. It's useful to establish a baseline in initial letters, because if it suddenly changes you can investigate

It's what we do subconsciously with family members, we often notice that subtle changes are occurring by things you can't outwardly see