30 Times Doctors Crossed Boundaries And Blurted Out The Most Weird Things To Patients

My first daughter was failure to thrive. At 7 months she had gained from a birthweight of 6lbs 11 oz only as far as 12 lbs. this is despite us trying constantly to get her to eat. After eating a very small amount she would start screaming. In pain. Obvious to me. So we took her to dr. He said I was a hysterical young mother who didn’t know what I was talking about. He called children’s aid on me and reported me for not feeding her. I’m guessing he thought I was a monchausen by proxy mother. He also referred to a Pediatrician who also dismissed my concerns as her “playing with her voice”. When I argued I was again told I was a hysterical young mother who didn’t know what I was talking about.

at 7 months of age we took her to emerg at McMaster university medical centre. They actually looked at her and discovered stage 4 cancer. It started in her liver. She was screaming in pain from eating as it must have felt much like a gallbladder attack due to the swelling from the tumours. She died because doctors thought I was a hysterical young mother who didn’t know what I was talking about.

That my mammogram showed no signs of tumor. I read the report, and each breast had the exact same description. The doctor had written the same report about both sides of my breasts. I got a sonogram and my right had three malignant tumors that had spread to my lymph system. I was in stage 3. After chemo, surgery, radiation, and nightly meds, I’m going strong.

Not me but my cousin. “Your period can’t hurt that badly”. She then went on to years and years of painful almost debilitating periods. They were so bad and she thought it was normal…well almost normal. She knew it was not as bad for other girls but was convinced it was just a bad case of cramps every month. Finally as an adult a friend convinced her to see their gynecologist and that one ordered an ultrasound. This doctor sent her to HER doctor who performed the ultrasound and said you’re not going home today we’re performing surgery ASAP.

Turns out she had 8 pounds of dermoids in her uterus and some even had teeth and hair. If they had kept growing her uterus could have burst and k**led her. But because one doctor brushed off her symptoms and never really did anything about it she almost died. If they had been discovered earlier there were things they would have known to look out for and she would have had less health issues related to uterine health. Eventually she had an hysterectomy at 28 and that stemmed partially from this doctor ignoring her initial complaint.

Unfortunately it seems epidemic that doctors more frequently brush off women’s complaints about their pain and isn’t that a sad medical fact.

I probably could write a book on the failings of the medical community in my care. I will stick with this: while fighting breast cancer, and simultaneously suffering with fibromyalgia, I had kidney stones for good measure. Imagine the pain you would be in? I was given toradol.

Not treating patient’s pain has been the most ignorant abuse of power I have seen, and I have seen it over and over in my care. 3 oncologists refused pain meds for me after my chemo regimen changed. I was still getting bags of dr*gs, but these weren’t the kind that your hair falls out anymore. It caused sores all over my arms. It caused pain in my joints and hands.

I woke up from my cancer surgeries screaming, shaking from inadequate pain meds. Choosing to treat all humans like dr*g addicts is the most ignorant s**t I have seen.

The local doctor in our small town did not believe I had asthma. I had been diagnosed when I was a little baby. I had to take a day off work every month to see him, before he would refill my medications. I bugged him until he relented and made an appointment with a large medical teaching school that was known well for their outstanding work. Loma Linda Medical University, which had taken great care of our special needs child.

They ran their tests, sent them to the doctor. I asked why I still had to come in each month. His answer, “They made a mistake”.

Months later, during the spring I was having great difficulty breathing. I went to the doctor. He would not see me, but had his NP, Nurse Practitioner, see me. She, Fancy, called him over for a consult outside the door of my room, then she came back in to see me. She told me she was going to get in trouble, but she told me to cross the parking lot and go into the emergency room.

I walked in the door and headed toward the check-in counter. I was intercepted by 2 men and a gurney. They waylaid me and hurried me into the ED. I was connected to oxygen, given a shot of tetracycline, adrenaline, and a breathing treatment. Twenty minutes later, another breathing treatment.

Then they called in the doctor. They had him stand fifteen feet from me. Then they, 2 ED Doctors, chewed him out. They let him know that if Fancy had sent me home as he had told her to do, I would not have lived through the afternoon, much less the night.

Last time I, or any of my family saw him. We drove a ways to where there were better doctors. His business began to fail, lack of customers, aka, patients. He retired, thankfully.

My Baba's, (Ukrainian grandmother), doctor told her on a routine check-up to stop eating sour cream; stick to white chicken meat, not thighs; switch from rye bread to whole wheat and avoid anything pickled like herring and beets because they were all bad for her health.

She was 87 years old and told him she'd already buried 3 doctors, she'd bury him too but promised to switch to light sour cream.

My daughter was just at that age where she had begun menstruationand she wasn't doing well. She was very pale, bruised easily, was tired all of the time; classic anemia. I took her to the doctor at the local Air Force base (my husband was army worth a local posting). The brilliant doctor that saw her, after getting a lost off symptoms, and without a single blood test, pronounced her to be a “troubled teen”. He tried unconscionably hard to pressure me into having her committed to an institution. I was dumb founded!

After seeing a second doctor, out of pocket, he actually tested her, but before the results were in, he said that it was a “classic severe case” of anemia and that she would have been in great danger had she remained untreated. The results proved that to be true. He prescribed a certain kind of iron and as long as she took it she was as good as new.

And for those that wonder why I didn't just buy iron supplements and call it a day, her symptoms seemed very extreme to me, though classic. Better to check and be sure.

My sister Sharon’s older son, Russell, was seven years old when he developed crippling pain in his lower right abdomen. My sister’s first thought was “appendicitis,” and she took him to our local children’s hospital, thinking that he would need surgery right away. Sharon was herself sick with strep throat at the time. The doctor examined him and announced that it wasn’t appendicitis, but given Sharon’s condition at the time, the doctor said, “He has strep throat in his side,” (his exact words) and sent them home with antibiotics for strep.

That was “most ignorant thing I’ve heard from a medical doctor” #1 in this saga.

After several days on ABs, Russell was no better and literally couldn’t walk upright. He was bent over double and clutching his right side from the intense pain. We took him back to the children’s hospital, hoping to see a different and more intelligent doctor. We did get a different doctor, who listened patiently to the history. We told him several times that we were certain it was appendicitis. They ran some bloodwork, and while we waited for the results, the doctor wanted to run another test on Russell. He told my nephew to stand up straight (in spite of the debilitating pain of doing so), stand on his right foot, and hop up and down several times. Russell did so. He was trying to be stoic about the pain while he did this “test.” The doctor then announced that a person who has appendicitis cannot physically stand on their right foot and jump up and down without collapsing from the pain. So, this doctor said that there was no way that Russell had appendicitis. I don’t know whether he even looked at the bloodwork results; he had already made up his mind, and he sent us home, saying that Russell should stay on the antibiotics, and the situation would resolve itself.

That was “most ignorant thing I’ve heard from a medical doctor” #2.

And just to tell you “the rest of the story”:

The next day, my sister took Russell to their pediatrician to get a third opinion. Russell had a very high fever by this time and could barely walk. The pediatrician ordered Sharon to get her son to the local university hospital (NOT children’s) immediately, where the ER doctors took the situation very seriously, and listened to us when we said that we were sure it was appendicitis. They ran their tests, of course, and told us that Russell had, indeed, had appendicitis, but now he had a much worse condition. His appendix had burst (thanks to the delay in competent treatment), and by then, infection had been flung throughout his abdomen. They admitted him immediately, performed surgery, and then started him on IV antibiotics, but they got across to us the seriousness of his situation. He was by no means out of the woods. It took about 2.5 weeks in the hospital on strong antibiotics to pull him through. He came home with a tube protruding from his side that was to drain any remaining infection.

Had the children’s hospital made the obvious diagnosis the first, or even the second, time, a lot of time, pain, effort, and money could have been saved.

Russell is now a very lean 6’5” 30 year old.

When my daughter was 4 I took her for her yearly check-up. I stated she was still peeing at night so I was putting her in pull-ups. The doctor said the reason she was still peeing at night was because of the pull-ups and that I should immediately stop using them. I felt like I was a horrible mom so for the next year, multiple times a week she would wake me up because of a wet bed, I would help her change, strip her bed and remake it. Some nights I would just make her a bed on the floor. I was exhausted and cranky because I also had a newborn waking me up at night and I was not always patient with her. A year later I went to a different doctor and told her of our dilemma, she simply stated why aren’t you just using pull-ups? ARGGG After that we all slept through the night and life was so much sweeter. She did thankfully grow out of it at age 8.

I had just changed primary care doctors several years ago and had to see this new doctor for the first time, can’t remember what for but probably a sinus infection or something equally simple and treatable. Since it was my first time meeting him, he was making conversation and asked if I had any children. I said not yet, and that my husband and I were looking at possibly adopting. He asked if there were medical issues that made adoption necessary. I said no, it was just something that I knew would always be an option for us. He told me, “If you can have your own biological children, don’t adopt. You won’t form the same kind of bonds with an adopted child that you will with your own.” A nurse was in the room at the time and she jumped in before I could even begin to respond. She more or less chewed out this doctor! I was in 100% agreement with her… she said something like, “Why would you assume that? I know lots of people who have both adopted and had biological children.” He actually tried to argue with her. He said, “But I bet if you got them to be totally honest, they would tell you that they are closer to their biological children.” I was witnessing a heated exchange between nurse and doctor, and completely siding with the nurse who put him in his place for expressing his opinions about something I had not asked him about. Neither one of them backed down. I suspect they continued to have words after I left; thankfully I had already gotten what I needed from the appointment. And, thankfully I didn’t listen to him. My husband and I went on to have two biological children and we adopted one child. And I can very confidently say that we love all three of them with all our hearts. Each one is very different. And for that, I am thrilled and grateful.

I grew up on a farm, and we had chickens. When I was 3 or 4, we ended up with too many roosters. They has problems, including them becoming significantly more aggressive. Combine that with me possibly antagonizing a bird slightly and I got spurred in my wrist.

For those who may not be aware, roosters have a long fixed talon on the back of their leg that they use for fighting and defense. This is why cock fights are so bloody, brutal, and illegal. They also walk around in poop all day.

So, after the initial accident my mom patched me up. I may have seen a local doctor, I don't know. The following days I started getting really sick… to the point where my mother took me to urgent care.

When we finally got in to see the doctor, he asked what was wrong. My mom said I had gotten badly injured and was worried the wound was infected. The doctor asked how I had gotten hurt and my mom said I was attacked by a rooster.

The doctor for whatever reason thought that was hilarious. Like bent over laughing… maybe he thought it was a put on? Or maybe he thinks of chickens how cartoons portray them and couldn't imagine them being dangerous. I don't know. The fact of the matter was I had blood poisoning (as we discovered later) and the doctor was laughing at a very sick little kid.

My mother asked me to wait in the hall. I was little, so the memory isn't super detailed, but I do recall hearing her through the door threatening to “bring the rooster to your office so it can punch a bunch of holes in you, too.”

He then examined me, far more sheepishly than before… then things got dead serious for a little bit while they tried to prevent me from dying from an otherwise hilarious rooster attack.

Went to the doctor for test results back in the day. The pain in my stomach had me worried I might have anything from an ulcer to Bigfoot growing in there.

The doctor walked into the office and began by “I’ve got some bad news. You have cancer.”

Shock was followed by gloom and a hint of despair as the doctor began to outline what the plan of attack was and the next doctor I would have to see and what my odds were for my kind of cancer. I sat there stunned, trying to take everything in and thinking I should be asking questions or taking notes or something other than just sitting there.

“. . . There have been a lot of good work in the past few years with this kind of cancer, but you still might want to go ahead and tie up loose ends to be on the safe side. The oncologist I’m sending you to will want to do his own tests, but he comes highly recommended and he’ll probably take an aggressive approach right from the start. But you’re young and you’ll have a fighting chance to beat this, Brian.”

It took me a second, but I did ask my first question. “Brian?”

The doctor didn’t even blink. “I like to use first names, but if you’d rather I call you Mr. Watley. . . .”

“Watley?” Something was clicking in my head. “You’ve made a mistake.”

“No, Brian. The tests are conclusive. You have cancer and. . . .”

I stood up. “Apparently Brian Watley has cancer. . . and I’m not him.”

To be fair, the man had met me briefly before sending me off to have tests to determine the pains in my stomach and a nurse probably ordered the file folders on his desk, but to provide someone with a scary diagnosis without first being sure of who you are talking to was unforgivable in my mind. I waited as he found my diagnosis— a food allergy— provided me with some lifestyle changes and sent me on my way with no apology in sight.

I found a new doctor who sent me to a nutritionist and has been my primary care doctor now for about 20 years.

When I was in my mid 20s, I started gaining weight. A LOT of weight. So my doctor put me on a diet. I followed it religiously (weighing my food out to the gram). It was 1,200 calories a day, I was always hungry, never had any energy, and was still gaining weight. Two months later, I go back to my doctor, who starts by noting that I’m still gaining weight (30 pounds in 2 months) and then asks why I’m not following the diet he gave me. I told him I was, then I made the mistake of mentioning how hard it was. He looked me straight in the eye and told me “if you were actually following the diet I gave you, you’d have lost 30 pounds, not gained 30 pounds.” I left that doctor’s appointment in tears and left feeling like a horrible human being. I stopped seeing that doctor a few months later for completely unrelated reasons.

Oddly enough, it only took my new doctor a few weeks to diagnose me with a small tumor on my pituitary gland. Tumor removed, I was able to go back up to eating 2,000 calories a day like a normal person and almost all the excess weight went away within a few months. I don’t think the tumor would have k**led me if left untreated but it’s appalling to me that a medical doctor would rather think a patient was willfully lying to them than look at why that patient’s body wasn’t behaving as expected of a healthy individual.

I was a young 10 year old girl who had never thought about her weight. I wore comfortable shorts and I loved this pretty summertime, colourful, unicorn tank top that I had, I wore it a lot. All that little girl knew was that she was healthy, ate very healthy, and loved to exercise and play. Then that little girl went to the family doctor for a standard check-up one day and the doctor took out a chart. She said it was a weight chart. She pointed to a point on the chart and said “this is the weight you should be for your age,” then she pointed at another point on the chart and said, “and you’re waaaaaay over here. You need to stop eating as much sugar and start exercising more.”

When I went home and looked in the mirror that day, I could no longer see that girl, that playful little girl who liked her body. She was gone, lost forever to the world where your worth is measured by how much you weigh. The little girls’ comfortable shorts grew dusty at the bottom of her dresser, and as often as I had looked at that unicorn tank top and considered wearing it, all I could see when I put it on was fat, fat, fat, fat. So I never wore that unicorn tank top again, the shorts I had outgrown without even wearing them, and I no longer wore dresses, just baggy sweaters. The doctors’ words rang in my head and I gradually become less healthy, started binge eating and starving myself. I can no longer see that playful girl when I look in the mirror, I can no longer see myself, all I can see is imperfection and hatred.

I’m a teenager now and I probably would’ve become insecure either way, but my doctor shouldn’t have said that to me. I was just 10 years old and I was perfectly healthy and active, there was no need for her to do what she did. It’s been a long time but she’s still my family doctor and I still remember what she did, how she made me realize, how she made me start to hate myself. I know doctors make mistakes and I think she’s a good doctor, I don’t doubt her skills, but either way, I think it was quite stupid of her and hurtful to me to have shown me that chart and said what did to me.

I was playing in a basketball league and jammed my finger, like I have many times before. This time was different though. I immediately noticed that I couldn’t straighten my finger. It was bent down, not all the way like in a fist, but about halfway down. I could push it straight with another finger but couldn’t straighten it on my own.

Two days later it’s still in the same condition. The swelling and pain had reduced but still couldn’t straighten it. So I make an appointment to see my primary care Dr. He does x-rays and verifies it’s not broken. He’s about to send me on my way. I ask him, “well what about the issue where I can’t straighten my finger?” He tells me it will be fine, it will straighten out on its own in a few weeks. This didn’t sound right to me at all. So I asked if he could refer me to a hand specialist. He said that was a waste of time and money. I said that’s ok, it’s my time and money. He was resistant but referred me.

Cut to a week and half later when I saw the hand specialist. He immediately knew what was wrong. I had a ruptured tendon in my finger, better know as mallet finger. It’s not an uncommon injury. This doesn’t get better on its own without treatment. Without some basic treatment my finger would have eventually healed incorrectly and been left disfigured and permanently bent.

The treatment for mallet finger was simple and easy. Put my finger in a splint so it’s held straight. Keep it this way so my tendon could regrow and reattach. I did that as instructed by the good doctor and like magic my finger is as good as new. Good thing I was not willing to listen to my primary care Dr. who didn’t know what this common condition was.

It was actually three different Gynecologist. I was in my late 20s, I hadn’t a period in years, I had morning sickness everyday and hot flashes. I had other symptoms, that could’ve just past off as no big deal, but still they were symptoms. Each Gynecologist said, “…there is nothing wrong with you, it is all in your head.”
Finally I went to an Endocrinologist that told me WHAT WAS IN MY HEAD! I had a pituitary tumor (benign). These little buggers create a lot of havoc in your body, throughout your life.
I got a copy of one of the Gynecologist’s notes on me. He had blood work that proved I had a tumor and he did nothing. Didn’t refer me, or even tell me that something was wrong.

When my son was two going on three years old, I noticed that he was having a lot of nosebleeds for no apparent reason. It was to the point where at any moment throughout the day, I would look at him and he would have blood trickling out of his nose. I also noticed that he had an extreme amount of bruises, including bruises up and down both sides of his spinal column on his back, to the point where I could actually distinguish the location of each vertebrae from the bruises emanating from them. This went on for several months and I became quite alarmed.

At his three-year well-child exam, I brought it up to the pediatrician and asked that he have some blood work done. I was, of course, concerned about leukemia. The pediatrician chuckled condescendingly at me and said, “He's in daycare and he's three. He's going to have bruises. I would be worried if he DIDN'T have bruises!” I again mentioned the strange pattern of bruising along his spinal column. She said he was probably crawling under tables and chairs at daycare and getting the bruises from that. Then she said, “He's probably fine, but if it will make you happy, I will humor you and do some testing. But I am sure it will come back negative.” Humor me?? I couldn't believe she used that tone with me, a concerned parent. I was beyond infuriated.

The blood work was obtained, and that doctor personally called me with the results rather than having a nurse call me, so I knew something was wrong. The doctor still did not apologize to me, though! Thankfully, it wasn't leukemia. It turned out my son has a bleeding disorder (not hemophilia, but along those lines). He was referred to a pediatric hematologist for treatment . He is now a healthy 18-year-old in his first year of college.

I have never forgiven that doctor for her condescending tone that day, and I strongly feel that as a pediatrician, she should know better than to question a mother's instinct like that. I never questioned my motherly instincts again!! If you are a parent, you know when something is not right with your kid. Trust your gut!! And don't let any doctor tell you otherwise. They don't know your child like you do.

My 8 year old son (see last line re: stupid) had painful stomach cramps that were misdiagnosed by his pediatrician as hysteria or malingering. I was able to get him admitted to King’s Daughters for observation. It was tough to see the residents come in and watch their eyes display disinterest after interviewing us.

All that changed after the pediatric gastrointestinal specialist finished his examination. After a quick examination, he diagnosed the problem as abdominal migraine. Within minutes, we had several residents stopping in to learn about the gastric migraine and how they could have diagnosed it. All came except my son’s pediatrician. During rounds the next morning, he lectured my son about not bothering his parents with phantom illnesses. After I lectured the pediatrician on the importance of staying current on his patient’s chart, I warned him I was coming very close to becoming violent with him and asked him to leave. Stupidity comes in with pediatrician either not reading the chart or not believing what he was reading. To verify, I searched the MicroMedex (20 years ago) and quickly found the reference for abdominal migraine. Such stupidity and arrogance for the peds guy to not bother with research!

I have severe neurological diseases. I was having difficulty opening my mouth. I asked the neurologist if the symptom was the result of my disease. He asked me how far I could open my mouth and commented that it was severely compromised. His next follow up statement was “at least you’ll lose weight”. I was not overweight. He made no further recommendations. Eventually when this progressed a week later it was discovered to be a life threatening reaction to a medication. Wish it was my only bad encounter with the medical profession.

When I was five years old, I developed migraine headaches. My parents took me to a doctor because they were afraid I had a brain tumor, which was a logical concern on their part—most little kids don’t have headaches at all, and I was having attacks once or twice a week where I would vomit and scream and be unable to bear light. Anyway, the doctor looked me over and explained that the problem was that I was an only child, and that if I had a little brother or sister, my headaches would disappear. And he sent me home, where I kept suffering.

To this day I’m still not sure what the basis for this “diagnosis” was, although since it was the 1970s and there were still a lot of myths around only children (which weren’t as common then as they are now) he may have thought I was either spoiled and faking for attention, or just neurotic because of my lack of a sibling. I did end up with a younger brother a few years after that, and a younger half-sister much later, but I kept having migraines throughout the rest of my childhood and well into adulthood—I still get them occasionally now in my late 40s.