To think men should not be allowed to be gynaecologists

[CaragianettE]

Just that, really. Saw one last week. He was trying to be helpful, but I really really really don’t want to discuss ‘do you get clots’ ‘do you experience flooding’ ‘do you find intercourse painful’ with a strange man. Yes it would be awkward with a strange woman too, but at least I know she likely has some lived experience of what we are talking about. TBH I also question men’s motives for choosing this job, not just the licence to look at strange women’s vaginas, but I think there’s something deep in the male psyche that just loves laying down the law to women about their reproductive systems. It’s a job for a woman, and while I know men were allowed to train for it in the past, I think they should now be phased out.

I just wanted to add to my earlier comment - because everyone says it's fine to have male gynaes with a chaperone - that I requested a female chaperone for the intimate examination. I've never had a gynae examination without one!

The creepy comments about how my vagina looked were made after the chaperone had left!

As I said, I don't dispute that there are female abusers, whether that be physical or sexual abusers or cases where they are found to have been responsible for committing egregious harm and neglect.

The statistics I have cited are not focused on men. They are population-wide and forensic sample statistics which compares the prevalence of sexual offences and paraphilias across both genders.

They almost always point to a significant difference in the propensity and incidence of sexual offences between the two sexes.

The British Society of Criminology has found that females make up 1 - 5% of sexual offenders in official Criminal Justice Statistics.

Is your argument that women are just as likely as men to commit these offences but don't get caught?

There is one study that has looked at that. A study published in the Journal of Forensic and Legal Medicine in 2018 by Louise Morgan and Lisa Long suggested that the true rates of female perpetration could be as high as 5 - 12%.

Again, not dismissing the severe consequences of female-perpetrated sexual offences but even at rates of 12%, that's not equal to men - not even close.

If you really believe that women are just as likely to have the same biological drive to commit sexual offences as men (unlikely in my opinion, they don't have equal levels of testosterone and physical strength for one thing), why are they also underrepresented in global statistics?

In countries where women are significantly economically and socially disadvantaged, you might expect more female sexual offenders to be more easily identifiable, caught, convicted and sentenced. But again, the rates still show that overwhelmingly, men are more likely to commit sexual offences than women.

I think there are many people on here who think men should just not be allowed, full stop.

Why should a doctor not care about what their patient is comfortable with?! I think that’s a pretty important quality in any doctor, regardless of gender, and particularly when they’re carrying out invasive procedures with semi-naked patients in sensitive, intimate areas!

So you want access to gynaecologists to be even harder?

Personally I have not experienced any issue with male gynaecologists. In fact when dealing fibroids I found male gynaecologists far more empathetic at me wanting to preserve my fertility.

But, for one example, if all the nuns running the children's homes were never investiged, charged, interviewed or studied, then they're not part of the statistics or numbers that get reported.

Women tend to slip through the net. Either their crimes are seen as 'not so bad' or they evade prosecution completely.

We're only just beginning to uncover the amount if domestic abuse that gets perputrated by women, and still people's attitudes are that it's 'not so bad'.

I think we need to be a bit more wary and open minded about the amount and seriosness of abuse commited by women, and not always looking in the direction of men alone (not that we should stop looking at men, obvs).

But simultaneously we'd have to add all the coercive control perpetrated by men to the stats that has also previously gone under recorded which will likely go a long way to cancel out the female perpetrated abuse in the stats.

And nuns make a statistically insignificant cohort of the UK population, so yes their crimes should be recognised, but i doubt they will make much of a dent in the numbers.

I used to work in social housing / social care. Coercive contol is very much perpetrated by women, they are most likely to abuse an elderly relative, not partners like men do. We had many awful cases of women taking pensions and benefits, using violence and threats to stop their victims from getting help, whilst playing the role of the dutiful daughter or niece whilst their poor old mum/uncle was denied medical treatment. Seriously, there are many sick and manipulative women out there. I had my eyes opened, elder abuse is often done by women.

You're prob going to come back and tell me that's statistically insignificant too, but I'm trying to tell you the statistics are not there - the campaign to root out elder abuse only really started in the 00's, i bet most people have never heard of it and aren't looking out for it.

Anyway, i don't want to labour the point too much. Women are abusers too, we don't think they are as prolific as men, but we should be wary as they don't present in the same way that male abusers do and often get overlooked. But we have to remember that their victims are just as real.

The studies can only cover a certain period in time and accounting for those specific cases would still be highly unlikely to cancel out the figures reported as part of findings in peer-reviewed research published by reputable sources such as the Journal of Forensic and Legal Medicine because they compare BOTH men and women over a single period in time.

And if we take the example of the nuns, we would also need to include the incidences of abuse committed by Priests to enable us to compare the incidences committed by both genders. Just using nuns for example and not referring to Priests, is disingenuous.

The Morgan and Long study I cited covered allegations of female sexual assault/ abuse reported by survivors of sexual abuse who were receiving care and support from a Rape and Sexual Violence Support Centre.

That is NOT the same as reporting a crime. The figures cited by Morgan and Long will not be represented in official crime statistics. They are for all intents and purposes "unrecorded" and examples of women who may have indeed slipped through the criminal justice net.

No one is arguing that crimes committed by women are "not as bad". Stop twisting my words please.

I am saying that your claim that women are "just as bad as men" in the sense that equal proportions of women as men can and do commit these crimes, is not borne out by the evidence and you haven't provided a single source to back up some of these claims.

You still haven't explained why economically and socially disadvantaged women in developing and third world countries are not routinely being charged and prosecuted to the same extent as men if their inherent biological drive to commit these crimes is basically equal to that of men.

You might be able to recognise elder abuse, but your reading comprehension is nearly as poor as your understanding of statistics.

I did not say that women don't abuse via coercive control, I said that men do too and neither male nor female coercive control has been properly measured and added to the statistics, so when you add both to the statistics at the same time, they are highly likely to cancel each other out.

Not to mention the proportion of sexual offences committed by men against women that go unreported according to the British Crime Survey for England and Wales.

And that from a Police report to prosecution, only 3% end up in conviction according to Rape Crisis England.

Thanks @MacNCheeze for responding to my completely statistic-free commentary with your far more detailed and informed one. Fascinating and terrifying.

Why would the chaperone leave? My doctor is never alone with me.

In all my NHS gynae examinations the chaperone has come for the examination and then left. They're usually a nurse or another HCP so pretty busy

Surely that defeats the object of having a chaperone?

You generally get a chaperone when they're doing the intimate vaginal examination because of the risk of having a doctor inappropriately touch your vagina etc - you don't have one just when you're chatting to the doctor.

I've also had gynaes that call in a chaperone for every examination - I guess they do it to protect themselves in the case of an allegation of abuse etc. As there would be two witness to anything

He is vile. I know doctors who worked with him and found him completely disrespectful and difficult to work with. It’s pretty obvious listening to him that so many of his stories are entirely invented and never even remotely happened.

I had always been fine with men becoming gynaecologists. But in recent years I found out that three of the creepiest boys in my year at medical school went into gynaecology. That really made me shudder. I’m trying not to let that affect my view.

Oh the nurse has always stayed whole time for mine

I agree with you OP only because I’ve had male doctors do a hysteroscopy which was horrific and traumatic. I’ve refused a male nurse for an internal vaginal scam twice. I don’t give a if I offended them or if they were ‘professionals’, it’s my body and it wasn’t happening!

For many women a chaperone would not help because it’s not about the potential for inappropriate behaviour. It’s about not wanting to discuss “intimate” ( hate that word but canmt think of a better one) subjects with a man. Or to be touched “intimately” by a man.

This is standard for the nhs in my experience (though sometimes a nurse did sit in for more complex appointments because they then know what the consultant has said and can talk through it afterwards).

But also in private hospitals they tend to have a few hcas to act as chaperones for a number of consultants and they just come in for a few minutes for the exam.

I don’t actually particularly like having a chaperone under this model as it’s just another nameless person witnessing the exam but I understand it protects doctors.

I’ve also had plenty of appointments / examinations without chaperones, particularly immediately pre-op, though I probably could have asked for one.

A doctor absolutely should care if their patients are uncomfortable or else they aren't a very good doctor! Banning men from gynacology is obviously unreasonable but women should be able to request to see a female one if they want and have that respected where it's possible. Otherwise some vulnerable women are going to end up missing out on essential healthcare because of trauma or other reasons that could make intimate examinations from male Drs incredibly difficult for them.

If lived experience is necessary then childless women can’t be lactation consultants or midwives ?!

It's not lived experience for me at all - it's the statistics around sexual violence/abuse that apply to all men and my own experiences with male doctors. Some are very good, and you you they are there to do their job well, but I have come across a few creeps and weirdos in my time and the power imbalance is so great in a medical setting that they are very well protected - no one would ever believe me. So I choose not to take the risk. For the sins of their fathers and all that....

This is such an immature view. It shouldn't matter what gender your health professionals are. They're experts and life savers. You can always ask for a chaperone. Grow up