AIBU or was the Doctor correct?

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I visited my GP this morning, I’m not someone who visits them regularly and I’ve been putting off this visit for a while.

He asked me what the visit was for. I started to say that I ‘thought’ I may have IBS, ‘woah’ he said, ‘that’s for me to decide, not you’.

Okay, so I started describing my symptoms. ‘You’ve been reading too much google you have’ he said ‘just use the word tummy, no need to say abdomen’ big sigh, roll eyes.

It put me on the back foot and I felt awkward to further explain my symptoms in case he pulled me up on my terminology again.

I do think I may have some issues with bile acid malabsorption but didn’t like to say in case he pulled me up on it. I just said I had yellow / orange stool. ‘POO’ he said.

I came away feeling like he thinks I’m some kind of hypochondriac who obsessively checks google for everything. Yes I have had a read to try and see what’s up with me but AIBU? Or was he rude?

Not that it’s relevant but I have a science degree and am very familiar with the right terminology for things, I could have been a nurse or doctor as far as he knew!!

I came away really annoyed. AIBU?

Patronizing wanker. Call the practice manager and let them know that not everyone needs to be spoken to like they’re on Romper Room. If he can’t cope with anatomically and medically accurate words like “abdomen” and “stool”, perhaps he should go and work in a paediatric environment.

I hate this patronising baby language from doctors, and to correct you when you we actually using accurate language is breathtaking arrogance.
He is supposed to be making you feel at ease so that you can comprehensively describe your symptoms and he can have a go at diagnosing?!!!
And then we wonder why doctors are known to minimise, under diagnose and Mis diagnose women’s health problems- it’s because they are too busy telling you off and patronising you.

Love the God joke upthread. Have to say this fits in with every medic I’ve ever been friends with and most I’ve been treated by, sorry docs!

He was obviously threatened by your articulate use of the correct terminology and responded by patronising you, he’s an idiot and you deserve better.

@fudgecat

It really irritated me when the pediatricians were referred to as "baby doctors" when I was in hospital having the babies

Me too.

In fact, the first time I heard one of the nurses using the term 'baby doctor' I was a bit confused at to what a 'baby doctor' was and then of course it clicked after a second or so.

It's so bloody patronising.

I've never had to be treated by one, but do proctologists now refer to themselves as 'bum doctors' when speaking to patients?

Making people feel like an idiot when they are already most likely highly embarrassed speaking about their bowel functions is going to stop someone coming back who has an urgent need to be seen. I don't normally advocate for a complaint but you felt uncomfortable after your appointment and that needs to be reflected upon. Please go back and see a different GP and please don't ever let anyone put you off accessing healthcare when you have a change in bowel habit

You shoulda just rolled with it..."Well doctor when I have choccy woccy or yogi for num nums my poo poo pie is lellow and my bot bot hurts".

He probably also hates that he is likely to be replaced by an A.I in the not too distant future and his ego can’t take it lol.

Years ago I had to deal with a doctor who kept referring to my 'front passage', I had no idea what he was talking about (we don't use that term where I'm from) so I kept saying, My what? You need to examine my what?

He just kept saying front passage until I finally clocked it and said, Oh you mean my VAGINA

What is wrong with these people!

@fudgecat

It really irritated me when the pediatricians were referred to as "baby doctors" when I was in hospital having the babies

Same here, and the baby's bottom was referred to as his/her 'tail'

@BlackIsQueen

Urgh. Wanker medic klaxon. I'd have torn a strip off him right there and then. Who the fuck does he think he is? Talking to a patient like that. Absolutely, complain and loudly.

This! Just a shame you weren't able to pull him up there and then - he probably wouldn't have expected you to argue back at all but he bloody deserved to be told how rude he was being. Certainly complain. The idea that only doctors can use correct anatomical vocab is bonkers but to a much lesser extent so are some PPs comments that they do 'as they have a science degree' or whatever (though I know they've been said with the best of intentions). I've got an arts degree and have often been asked if I'm a doctor or nurse. Regardless of your degree and career, you can take an interest in the world around you and many of us with arts degrees know plenty about science too, just as many scientists know plenty about, say, literature!

"If I use any words you don't understand, just let me know and I'll be happy to explain them"

Perfect!

Complain. Arrogant bastard. It's your body, you know best and good on you for being informed. I'm a lawyer, and do my research, and the number of times I've been spoken down to by doctors before dropping in that I'm a solicitor 😡

Honestly, this is the sort of crap that does lead to what - in my head at least - is a withering look and a request to speak to somebody who doesn't use the vocabulary of the average six year old to speak to fully grown women, because they sure as hell don't speak like this to men. Or, as I tend to do because I'm done with all this patronising shite, respond to them in a way that involves the maximum possible medical terminology - and occasionally an offer to explain the intricacies of biologic medication including why it doesn't give me anything remotely resembling 'a nice little buzz ' if we have time remaining at the end of the appointment.

What an arrogant prick. Adults don't use the word 'tummy'. I would complain.

@0blio

"If I use any words you don't understand, just let me know and I'll be happy to explain them"

Perfect!

Haha- definitely say this next time!

@fiftiesmum

Rude and arrogant

This!! Complain!!

He took ages with you because he's a beginner, probably.

This should be nipped in the bud. Send a letter to the practice manager with quotes and he will be punctured slightly, we can only hope.

Wow! When securing a doctors appointment currently means hours on hold and then braving the receptionist triage damn right we are going to Google our symptoms.

You are not being unreasonable. The doctor was bang out of order and incredibly rude.

You have every right to expect to be spoken to with respect and compassion by a doctor no matter how or why you found yourself in front of them.

Absolutely complain - there's no excuse for that amount of rudeness.

Doctors have called it a "tummy" to patients for decades. And decades. It has always irritated the hell out of me. Are/were they explicitly taught to use this infantile terminology.

NHS info webpages now seem to have adopted "poo" as the best word for poo. (I've always hated the term "bowel movement.") I think that is fair enough.

The other thing I really hate is being called by my first name without so much as a by your leave. Especially as I don't like the full version of my name, and go by a shortened version.

That is so rude and patronising - I've had similar though. A hospital doctor once said to me 'I won't bother explaining what's wrong with you because you wouldn't understand anyway' The words she thought I would struggle with were 'abdomen' and 'haematoma' (guess what I had a haematoma in my abdomen!) I told her to try me, and it turned out I understood fine. Much to her irritation

Thats awful. It's the doctors job to explain in whatever way the patient can understand. What an arse.

I would feed back (complain) via the practice. It’s absolutely not an appropriate way to speak with you and a couple of things make me wonder if he is just starting (or has just finished) his GP training.
Most GP trainees started their jobs 3 weeks ago, and a cohort qualified at the same time - his age and the fact he was with you such a long time make me wonder if he is still in training or very recently qualified in which case it’s much better he gets feedback about his manner now before he is more senior.

It was suggested by a neurologist that I'd Googled myself into a frenzy. Unfortunately I was right and Google just confirmed my suspicions, as did medical tests and another neurologist. What do doctors think reasonably intelligent people do when presenting with symptoms that they can't explain. They research them surely...

Bloody patronising git.

I think midwives use baby doctor because in some units the paediatricians are clear they are infact neonatologists and absolutely not paediatricians and in others they’re happy to be paediatricians. And of course more and more they’re not doctors at all but Advanced Neonatal Nurse practitioners. Baby doctor covers the whole lot of them. Infact I’ve heard midwives use it among themselves ‘can you bleep the baby doctors?’ Also distinguishes them from the obstetric team who are usually just ‘the doctors’