As a student, it can be difficult to deal with a patient who may be sexually inappropriate. Even though this experience did not happen to me, discussing the situation with another student did make me question what I would have done in the same situation.
A patient presented to the student with low back pain. This student was very professional in their manner, and from what I had observed in the past, was very efficient when treating a patient. Despite this, the patient was not appropriately responding to questions, but preferred the conversation to centre around how often he went to the gym and how much he could bench-press. Furthermore, the patient continuously made sexual innuendos throughout the session, for example, offering to remove more items of his clothing than his shirt. Despite these comments, the student ignored the way the patient was acting and what he was saying, and continued to perform the appropriate assessment and treatment. However, it did make the student feel very uncomfortable and resulted in them not wanting to treat the patient again.
As we discussed the situation afterwards, we all realised that it is quite difficult to know what to do in these situations. Do you simply ignore the patient’s comments? Do you tell them their comments are inappropriate? Do you continue or refuse to treat them? Even though I know I would have liked to speak up against the patient (in a professional way…), I don’t know if I would have had the confidence to do so and probably would have just ignored the patient and continued to treat. I think as a student, we can sometimes feel we are not empowered enough to speak against a patient. We all like a placement to go as smoothly as possible, not ruffle too many feathers and give ourselves a good name. However, the truth of the matter is we deserved to be treated with respect. We should never feel under obligation to treat someone if we are putting ourselves in a vulnerable or uncomfortable situation.
It is important that if situations like this do occur, speak up to the patient and bring it to someone’s attention. Furthermore, see if the patient can be transferred to another physio, or alternatively see if another person can be present during the session. These are the strategies I would try to implement. It would be good to hear other people’s viewpoints on this matter.
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1 comment:
This an extremely important and difficult issue but I am glad that it has been raised as it is much easier to talk about now in the third person than later if it is happening to you personally. Unfortnately it has happened to me, quite a while ago but I still remember it very well. I think the point of asking someone else to treat the person a very good idea especially if you are able to do this. Letting someone else know immediately is also vital. As has been highlighted we all deserve to be treated with respect. One other point I would add, is dont forget to document it, whether itt be in their notes or on a separate pice of paper that you sign, date and file. I look forward to also hearing what others have to say.
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