To have found my first mammogram really upsetting?

[YompingJo]

Got a letter through with very basic details if an appointment. Turned up and found the whole thing demeaning. Tiny room, intimidating machine taking up most of it. The radiologist was monosyllabic and bossy and manhandled me into the right position including grabbing each breast and shoving it into position, pushing other bits of my body out of the way, not once asking first. I know it's a necessary procedure, but a bit of sensitivity would have gone a long way, and having the respect to ask for consent before grabbing a breast is a basic consideration. I'm autistic and needed to know much more what to expect beforehand. The letter gave a way to request assistance in the case of SEN, but I don't consider myself to have SEN and didn't know what I'd need until I was right there, so that wasn't any help. There was a QR code for feedback, which I gave but I just feel... invaded and demeaned. AIBU?

It is the staff that saw OP that is doing that, not OP herself. She is sharing her story because she is upset, and rightly so.

People who work in healthcare, especially those that are dealing with intimate body areas, should have good bedside manner, put their patients at ease, and above all explain things and obtain consent.
I trained as an HCP, and I would have failed my patient facing OSCEs (practical exams) had I acted like the person OP encountered.

I was talking about telling the OP, as I quoted:

Just don't go next time.

HTH.

For my mammograms, I've been told "I'll need to help position your breasts" as a sort of blanket warning at the start rather than "I'm now going to reposition your breast" as it was happening, IYSWIM.

It didn't bother me, but then I am NT and acknowledging the breast wrangling as little as possible was fine with me.

I think next time, it would be good to say something like "I would be more comfortable if I was told what you are about to do before each time you have to handle my breasts".

They'll have heard all sorts, OP. They'll have had women with possibly cancerous masses and cancer patients who are tearful and scared.

Thinking back to recent medical stuff, just this year, which has included an MRI, ENT at my ears and a couple of gynae outpatient investigations, at three different hospitals and they've always told me what's going to happen, even if it's telling me, rather than asking me - "I just need to reposition this," "I'll be putting two fingers inside as I feel your front," - I've always been told what's happening next, and quite often they have checked I'm okay, and tell me to indicate if I'm not. I'm fairly sure my mammogram was like that, too, that I was told what would be happening. (ENT was the one I found most difficult, as it turned out.) I wonder if different health regions focus more on patients than others?

Another poster upthread has just suggested that the OP’s experience might put her off ever going again for a mammogram. My head is 🤯. The NHS isn’t anyone’s mum! It’s a taxpayer-funded service that is available for use. Go, don’t go; use its services, don’t use its services. 100% the OP’s choice, and what I meant by “just don’t go next time”, leaving unsaid “if it’s that awful”. Nobody is holding a gun to OP’s head, she has the right to roll the dice and take a chance on potential breast cancer not being detected too late. Many many women do.

I will never understand this sort of attitude. If a woman is old enough to be entitled to a routine mammogram on the NHS, she’s old enough to think these things through like an adult. If the room is too tiny, the machine too intimidating, the radiographer too curt/terse, if you feel manhandled - don’t go again 🤷‍♀️. What other options are there? Getting the world to bend to you isn’t an available choice when you’re talking about the allocation of scarce resources. Yes, minimum standards need to be met. It doesn’t sound to me that they weren’t (at all!).

Just amazed that women don’t see that it’s wrong to be manhandled without that first being discussed
A minimum level of ‘bedside manner’ is a prerequisite to all healthcare professionals.

Of course someone should not have touched your breasts without first explaining why. Of course you should complain.
Clearly the person dealing with you has forgotten their professional responsibilities to their client….ie you OP

On a more positive note it seems you just got a bad radiologist as most on here have had more considerate and professional experiences so you shouldn’t let this put you off for next time.

Gosh are you a HCP who treats patients like pieces of meat then?

Your comment that it’s not OK to give feedback if you feel you’ve been manhandled as we should be grateful for medical checks in one of the richest countries in the world is disgraceful.

I wonder if you had the same person doing your mammogram as I did OP.

i had the first one last year. I am not autistic but I was quite unnerved by the grabbing of my breasts (I would have preferred to have to option of positioning them myself (!), shoving my arms up and how painful the squeezing in the machine was. I know they probably have to fit a lot of people in and are doing it all day but it is too much to expect to not be treated like a herd of cows having their udders checked?

I’m sure men wouldn’t put up with their balls being grabbed, legs pushed open and pushed into a vice!

I would suggest the other option is, as many on this thread have done, to reassure the OP that that is not the usual experience - yes, the machine crushing your breasts to take the picture is not part of a fun day out, but mostly the radiographers are aware of this and try to make the whole experience as human as possible, and bring an awareness of your basic personhood into it - and it is highly probably her next mammogram will be significantly better. I've rarely seen the same radiographer two mammograms in a row, and most are very kind.

You might have a point. But that doesn't mean healthcare staff can just treat people disrespectfully. Like: 'Oh well, you're lucky to be having a test like this, I'll manhandle your boobs any way I choose!'

But that really is NOT the norm, so we need to stop perpetuating the inaccuracy that it is. We have one person @YompingJo saying she had a bad experience, and she's already said she's given them feedback, but most of the technicians are very professional, explain the procedure and are as compassionate as they can be while having to process significant numbers of women in as efficient a way as possible.

@YompingJo mentioned it was in a cramped room, well imagine that being your day after day working conditions often in a portacabin in Tescos car park .... we all go in, have our scan and we're done. Those ladies are in there for hours, doing scan after scan after scan, so let's cut them some slack.

lets check our privilege.

I've had 8/9 mammograms (a good few when ca was suspected).

I've ALWAYS been asked for my consent every time they manhandled each boob.

I've never had the same radiographer twice.

This is basic clinical care

Overall there is implied consent that you're there... BUT in the moment, during an intimate procedure when folk may be feeling vulnerable? Of course they should be doing this!

Ah yes.

Be a good woman, grateful for what you can get and shut up.

Seriously???

We are allowed to appreciate the NHS and also have feelings around the way we are treated.
The only way that things change are by speaking up and a situation like this is not okay.

Medical professionals should ask and talk you through what is going on, unless in a dire emergency (but I've found that most still do it then).

Being touched without consent in a non emergency medical setting is triggering for all sorts of people for a variety of reasons.

What puts me off is all the rude PPs telling her to suck it up, princess. That makes me feel like I could get treated like absolute dogshit at a medical appointment and no one would think it was unreasonable.

And some of these PPs are medical professionals? God no, I don't want to be at their mercy!

no, just get a sense of perspective. Someone was rude to you while offering an amazing service to detect a deadly disease while it is still early enough to be treated.

And actually, being there, is consent to have the procedure done.

And if you get breast cancer, I assure you, the procedures done to you will be many, and a lot more intrusive than this!

"And actually, being there, is consent to have the procedure done."

That sounds familiar.

Same thing is often said to women who try to report rape.

"You willingly went into the room/on a date, so whatever happens afterwards is fair game".

Your attitude and perspective is appalling.

Revolting and inaccurate analogy.

However busy or harassed an HCP is, a smile and a little verbal dialogue whilst treating you is surely the benchmark?

You sound so over the top it is ridiculous. I cannot take anyone seriously who contemplates the potential for them to be treated like 'dog shit' at a medical appointment. Please do grow up and stop using such childish analogies.

Totally agree. Lets get things into perspective. I am sorry but walking into that room on the understanding that a mammogram will take place is of course implying that you are giving consent to the procedure. If you did not consent you would not show up for the appointment. These people are performing such important tasks every day in sometimes cramped conditions. Yet they are chastised for not being smiley, not talking, not asking for consent when their priority is making clear images that can be clinically interpreted under time constraints. It is so baffling.

I've had many mammograms (and recently cancer) and usually the practitioner will say something like....I'm just going to manoeuvre you in to position. I can't remember ever having my permission asked and would have thought it odd. A bit of idle chit chat puts me at my ease and that was obviously missing for the OP but cramped conditions and a scary machine are par for the course with the NHS.

Only on MN would a lifesaving procedure be compared to a rape.
This is all very OTT.

I really don’t agree that attending means you consent to whatever they might do, especially if it’s your first time and you’re not sure what it involves or how it will feel.

I find smears extremely difficult and have occasionally been unable to go through with it - I was able to say I’m sorry I just can’t and rebook. I do regret wasting an appointment and always really try but it’s not true that I have pre-consented by walking in.

Of course HCPs don’t literally say “do you consent?” at every single step but they explain and say what they’re about to do so you can ask questions or say if you’re uncomfortable.

Remember that a significant proportion of women have been sexually abused or assaulted, and having their boobs grabbed may be difficult. I have every sympathy with overworked NHS staff but as PPs have said it doesn’t take any more time to be chatty and respectful as they do a mammogram- surely it makes their job easier to have an informed, co-operative/communicative patient.

And the comparison to rape is relevant even though the two things are on different levels. Comparing them isn’t saying one is as bad as the other, it’s just pointing out something they have in common. “You consented because you agreed to turn up/entered the room” is used as a defence of rape and is inaccurate in both cases.

It’s a screening procedure, not a
lifesaving one.

And it about consent, so yes, there are similarities.