A woman who requested a female NHS nurse to perform her cervical smear test was “embarrassed and distressed” after a person with stubble and a deep voice summoned her for the intimate procedure.
When the patient pointed out the mistake, the nurse replied: “My gender is not male. I’m a transsexual.”
This weekend, the woman, who decided not to go ahead with the examination, said it was “weird where somebody says to you: ‘My gender is not male’ and you think: ‘Well, what does that even mean? You are clearly a man.’ ”
The nurse “had an obviously male appearance . . . close-cropped hair, a male facial appearance and voice, large number of tattoos and facial stubble”, she said.
The woman received an official NHS apology after she made a complaint about her treatment.
The incident has been revealed as Justine Greening, the equalities minister and education secretary, is considering proposals that would allow people to change their gender legally without a doctor’s diagnosis.
The Sunday Times reported last week that a consultation on the changes to the Gender Recognition Act had been delayed amid claims Greening was getting cold feet about self-certification.
The patient said it was “bad enough for a fortysomething mother”, but the effect of such an incident on her 17-year-old daughter would have been much worse.
James Caspian, a psychotherapist who specialises in working with transgender people, said these kind of awkward situations would become more common if self-certification went ahead. “Politicians have not thought through all the implications of allowing self-certification,” he said.
The patient has requested anonymity for herself and the clinic because of fears it or the nurse could be criticised. The appointment for the test — also known as a cervical screening test — was on September 16 last year in an NHS clinic run by the Central and North West London NHS Foundation Trust.
In a letter of complaint sent afterwards, the patient said that when she booked her appointment she had requested a female nurse or practitioner.
She added: “People who are not comfortable about this are presented as bigots and this is . . . kind of how I was made to feel about it.”
She stressed her complaint was not about the nurse’s appearance or gender status.
It is understood the nurse self-identified as a woman but had not been employed on that basis. He saw the patient only because of a clerical error.
Central and North West London NHS Foundation Trust said: “We apologised to this patient for the recording error and because the staff member accepted they didn’t manage the situation appropriately; the patient needed to feel listened to. Trust policy is to consider seriously all requests for clinicians of a particular gender.”
@nicholashellen