To think that women should be able to request a female doctor or nurse?

[Betti935]

www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news/the-female-nhs-nurse-i-asked-for-came-with-stubble-83rq9p0gg

Summary: A woman requested a female nurse to carry out her cervical smear test. When she arrived the nurse was clearly male (stubble, deep voice etc). When she questioned this, the nurse insisted that they were a woman because they were trans. The patient says she was made to feel like a bigot and in the end decided not to go ahead with the smear test.

Now in this case, the NHS Trust has apologised and said that the nurse did not handle the situation appropriately. However the government are planning to introduce into law the recommendations of the Women and Equalities Committee which include, not only allowing men to 'self-identify' as women without any medical diagnosis of gender dysphoria, but also to get rid of the exemptions currently in place.

Currently, while biological males can legally 'become' women (following a diagnosis of gender dysphoria - there is already no requirement to have any hormone treatment or surgery), there are some limited exemptions in law:

“If a service provider provides single or separate sex services for women and men, or provides services differently to women and men, they should treat transsexual people according to the gender role in which they present. However, the Act does permit the service provider to provide a different service or exclude a person from the service, who is proposing to undergo, is undergoing or who has undergone, gender reassignment. This will only be lawful where the exclusion is a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim.” For example, it is currently legal for a group counselling session for female rape victims to exclude biological males if female clients would be not feel able to attend and participate in the group if they were present.

If this new legislation is passed and there are no exemptions allowing for transwomen (biological males) to be treated differently from biological women, there will be no way to protect vulnerable women who don't feel able to access rape services or medical services if they can't be sure of a female-only service.

This won't be like other rights conflicts (e.g. on sexual orientation versus religion) where test cases go to court and judgements are made because women won't exist as a separate protected group from transwomen.

Its so difficult.
With the limited resources in the NHS there often isnt a female back up on shift/avaliable if you needed one which is very traumatic and difficult if youre suffering with PTSD etc. Somethibg like a smear test which is rputine I think you should be able to request a female...but in hospital its not the same. For example giving birth there were only male doctors on when I was in labour. Xxx

Many women avoid the doctors because of being bullied about smear tests that they do not want. I personally do not have them anymore after weighing up the very low risk of getting cervical cancer and the very high risk of overtreatment that they do not discuss. It is nearly impossible to opt out of.

Some gps have sent letters to non conforming women threatening to remove them for not attending smear tests appointments. Many women suffer them under duress. They go to the doctors for an earache and get bullied into having it done there and then whether they want to or not. They're also happy to sedate you if you are distressed.

At a recent apointment at family planning this happened to me. I did not book an appointment for a smear and did not want one. The nurse offered and I declined. She went off to get a doctor to pressure me more. I still declined. The second doctor went off to get a third. I was now in a tiny room with 3 hcp who wouldnt accept No. It was awful.I left without my contraception and then received several letters and phone calls about it. I don't think this experience is that unusual.

Strangely enough my husband doesn't get harrassed in a similar way when he declines screening tests. To me there are already serious problems around informed consent in women's health care without this. I wonder how many poor women had to suffer this man performing smear tests on them or risk being called a transphobe.

liminality
I can only hope your own poor children never experience gender dysphoria or they will be destroyed by these toxic attitudes.

It's actually toxic masculinity that is far more likely to harm males experiencing gender dysphoria. Rape, murder, abuse of all kinds - perpetrated by men. The same problems women don't want to experience, actually, from people with the same anatomies, in circumstances where the women are not able to defend themselves - flat on their backs on an examining table for instance.

Despite over a hundred years of feminism, you apparently still believe it is females who must apparently do the work of accommodating transgender males in playing the role they feel expresses their innermost selves.

Women have the right to reject this role that men have assigned to us. We are not some blank screen onto which anyone can project whatever they wish about themselves or about us. We are not put on earth to sort out everyone's problems for them.

Just because we are women doesn't mean we are everyone's goddamn mother. That is the prison of gender roles and gendered expectations that women have tried to break free from since the dawn of organised women's movements.

If rejecting this role entails rejecting the men dressed as women who try to perform 'femininity' from unwanted involvement in their healthcare or inclusion in their spaces, that is well and good.

The feminism threads are some of the most horrific things I have ever read.

You lead a very sheltered life then.

I used to work on a critical care unit and one of the agency staff , several times, was trans mtf. I found it uncomfortable and found I was trying to do stuff such that I would attend to personal care needs and she would do general stuff like housekeeping and paperwork. Many of my patients were in altered state of consciousness or very seriously ill and I felt the women especially should be cared for by a woman or at least a man who wasnt pretending to be a woman. It didn't seem fair.. equally you can't stop her having a job. She was laughed at openly by relatives and I remember one charming family asking her if she still had a penis.. that isnt right at all to actively harrass someone. But I feel she shouldn't have been working on a ward where patients can't make a conscious choice. Maybe she should have worked in somewhere like renal or clinics or sexual health.

Did also want to say though some women are no angels either. I was sexually assaulted by a female doctor twice between age 16 and 19 and have been shouted at, physically hurt and humiliated by various female nurses and doctors through ten years of gynae appointments. A woman isn't necessarily any safer unfortunately. The whole way we treat women when it comes to gynae and sexual health is awful.

Like many women I hate having smears. I find them embarrassing and often painful. It takes a lot to psych myself up to get them done, and of course I request a female HCP to do it.

If I got as far as the doctor's office and then a man came in to do it I would freak out. I really wouldn't care how they explained why they were there I would be very upset and angry that they thought it was in any way shape of form acceptable and there is absolutely no way I'd let them do anything to me. I'd almost certainly not go back.

This is me as a 40+ year old woman, sure in my opinions and confident in my rights. As a young woman I doubt I would have felt I could do anything other than let him do the smear even though I would have been tense and frightened and so the test would have certainly hurt and I would have experienced it pretty much as sexual assault.

I remember going to see a GP with tonsillitis as a young woman (early 20s) and him making me take my top off (I was not wearing a bra) to listen to my heart. I knew it was very wrong but could do nothing at the time and afterwards felt too ashamed to even complain. I admire this woman for kicking up a fuss and hope that the hospital makes changes so this cannot happen again.

The way MN paints trans people out to be the devil makes my blood boil. It literally does not affect your life, but you are all off your faces with fear and bigotry. The feminism threads are some of the most horrific things I have ever read. You all ought to be ashamed.

Have you actually read any of the trans threads?

Many of the women on there are very good friends with trans people. If fact trans people post on the threads. In suppprt of women.

If you had read them, you would know there are two types of transwomen. Homosexual transsexuals who transition due to gender dysphoria, and autogynephiles who transition due to a sexual motivation.

The latter cohort are generally attracted to women.

Autogynephilia is a fetish. It can develop into an obsession with women's biology. Pregnancy, breastfeeding, menstuation, etc.

Do you seriously think it's acceptable or ethical for an autogynephile to conduct a smear test?

Do you have any magic way of being able to tell a homosexual transsexual from an autogynephile who is fetishing your very body and the procedure they are carrying out?

Do you think women, ever, under any circumstances should be placed in this position? In order to validate a man's mental condition/fetish?

There may well be women who do not mind a male HCP. And most male HCPs are not in a position to call her bigoted if she refuses them.

Because, of course, it is generally understood many women are not comfortable with men performing intimate procedures.

The extra layer of discomfort if that man identified as a woman is a ridiculous hurdle for women to have to negotiate.

But go ahead. You keep telling us that we think they are the devil.

Don't let little things like facts get in the way of your bigotry.

As far as I can see it's yet another way for men to dominate women and control them.

I don’t think anyone on the feminism board thinks trans women are the devil. They are rightly concerned about women being asked to give up rights and safe spaces to accommodate male bodied people. And for women to accept their traditional gender roles being reasserted on to them by a group of people that believe there is such a thing as male and female brains and male vs female likes and dislikes.

Basically going against everything women have fought for over the last hundred years.

If it was a case of live and let live then trans women would stop picking on lesbians for not being feminine enough.

I have been in the position of having a man do a cervical smear and it was horrendous. I had to do it because he was the only one available in the foreign country I was in. It was humiliating and embarrassing. If I’d asked for a woman and gotten a man I would have walked out. I knew what I was getting before hand and had steeled myself.

I actually don’t agree with the right to chose the sex of your healthcare professional. I think the practice is discriminatory.

Gynaecology seems like a strange career choice for someone affected by gender dysphoria. Wouldn’t it be terribly “triggering”?

Skaros How would you frame that opinion to a rape victim?

Your PTSD and fear of men is discrimination. Please stop?

Skarossinkplunger

How does that work in practice?

You think a woman should be forced to undergo an intimate examination from a man who might be fetishising her biology?

Otherwise she is being discriminatory?

Think there will be some huge problems 're. Transgender rights vs religious rights vs cultural rights. Good luck to the courts with this!

I'm confused, were told all the time this simply doesn't happen?

skaross- so females should just accept whoever they are given? what bollocks.

I had to take my 12 year old dd for an intimate examination a few years back when she had an infection. it was bloody difficult persuading her to go to the doctor at all- but if she had not been allowed to choose a female Doc she would never EVER have gone. Do you think my 12 year old was 'discriminatory' ?

Yes.

"Fearing all men because one has raped you is discriminatory"

Wow. What a disgusting post. How dare you belittle people's experiences and anxieties. I hope your post gets deleted.

I do actually. I think fearing all men because one has raped you is discriminatory. In the same way that hating all Muslims because some are terrorists is discriminatory.

I do not fear all men because of my rape. I am in a loving relationship with a man.

An intimate exam carried out my a man I do not know triggers a panic attack. It brings back my PTSD. Why should I put myself through that?
Why should my distress not matter?

You clearly have no idea what you are talking about.

There is no right to an HCP of a particular gender. We'll do our best to help but if you want the absolute right to choose your HCP, that's what the private sector is for.

I have been in exactly your daughter’s position at exactly the same age. I had repeated tests and internal examination which led to me having my hymen broken surgically. They were all done by a male
consultant because he was the best consultant available.

Skarossinkplunger

Are you saying that it's discriminatory to refuse an autogynephile to do an intimate examination on you?

I’m sure it will RythmStix