Yesterday I went into the doctors office. As is standard, a nurse took my temperature and blood pressure plus asked all the basic writeup questions.
When doing so she took my outstretched left arm and placed it palm side towards her body. Thing is she tucked it under her arm so my hand was basically lying on her right breast (Yes she had fairly large breasts).
I was taken a little by surprise but was careful to not squeeze my hand or otherwise move it since I did NOT want to be accused of fondling her or doing something bad. I just let her finish taking my BP.
NO, I didnt get a “thrill” out of it! But yeah, some thoughts definitely popped into my head but I try to be a moral person and I dont want to do inappropriate things.
Now I’ve had my blood pressure taken dozens of time and never had this happen. Most times they just have me stretch out my arm and I never touch them.
Thing is, there was almost certainly nothing sexual in her actions. Nurses are obviously a lot less body concious than most (if part of your job involves sticking things up people’s bums, that tends to be a side effect ), so probably didn’t think anything of it. For her, it’s probably just an efficient, comfortable way of doing things. She probably didn’t think that might cause other people discomfort.
On the other hand, something like that is clearly going to cause someone discomfort (it did for you!) so she probably needs to be made aware of this. Maybe a quiet chat with the practice manager or someone wouldn’t hurt - but if it were me I would make it clear that it wasn’t a complaint, just something they might want to be aware of.
She has large breasts, and they get onto things if she’s holding something under her arm. That doesn’t sound like sexual behavior. It sounds like she’s had some number of patients she doesn’t trust to hold still when told.
Its up to you. If you think there’s any significant chance she had improper motives, then maybe you should report it. If you think her motives were fine but it might cause others to feel uncomfortable, maybe you should mention it to her discretely (if you feel comfortable with it). If not, then you don’t have to mention it at all.
I doubt I would report it to anyone else, but I might have said something to her.
Not like it’s a big deal, but not in a joking manner either. Something like “Can you hold my arm differently? I don’t want to feel your boob.”
I have never had a nurse put an armlock on me to take my blood pressure. Usually I just put my arm on the table and they put the cuff on me from there.
I have had this happen to me too but I’ve never thought twice about it … maybe because I am a (straight) woman and it just wouldn’t occur to me that she’d be doing anything other than her job.
I’m going to guess when you wrangle plenty of patient body parts, from time to time, it may work out less than ideal, perhaps even bordering on the awkward. More so if endowed with larger breasts.
I’d be willing to cut a medical professional a little slack, in this regard. Benefit of the doubt and all. Chances are, if you felt the awkward, she did too. Probably thankful you didn’t mention it.
But none of us were there, only you know for sure how it felt exactly.
I probably wouldn’t bother. When I was doing physical therapy, at first I found it sort of odd that they were practically putting my hands all over their chest…then after a while I realized they’re pretty used to, more or less, putting people’s hands there and I got used to (trying not to) practically groping them when I spent 3-4 hours a week with them putting my arm into positions like this and all kinds of other ones where they’re using their body to get more leverage or stabilize my hand or arm…which it sounds the case was with your nurse.
In short, she probably thought nothing of it. If it really made you that uncomfortable, you could call, but you’ll probably never see her again so I wouldn’t sweat it.
Unless she was doing something really explicit, you should probably just tell yourself she wasn’t doing it on purpose, she wasn’t coming on to you, she wasn’t doing it make you feel uncomfortable. That’s just the way she does things. Look at the picture I posted. You probably didn’t think anything of it. But both of my physical therapists were females. I don’t think it would be fair to tell my female PTs that they have to do my therapy differently (and probably not as well) because…well, because they’re female.
But, like I said, I got used to it pretty quickly.
Have to agree with Bone. Had something similar happen about a year ago in my doctor’s office. A young nurse was taking my BP and bent over in front of me to slip that little gizmo on my index finger (not sure what it’s for) and it was very obvious she wasn’t wearing a bra and her blouse should have been buttoned up at least one more button. So I mention to her right then and there, “Nurse, you can’t expect to get an accurate BP reading from us old guys when you bend over in front of us like that”. She didn’t mention anything AND didn’t button the button. She also wasn’t at the office the next time I went in.
Next time, give a gentle squeeze and say “Honk honk!”
I’m trying to figure the positioning of the two people. I’ve had nurses hold onto my arm before, but because we’re more or less facing each other, my hand was behind her, nowhere near a breast.
), so probably didn’t think anything of it. For her, it’s probably just an efficient, comfortable way of doing things. She probably didn’t think that might cause other people discomfort.
