“Are You Sure You’ve Never Given Birth?”: 66 Times Doctors Confused, Offended And Scared Their Patients

While trying to prescribe me for some medicine because my potassium was low. I asked, "Can't I just eat more bananas?" He said "Well you'd have to eat two and a half feet of bananas a day."

1. Doable
2. That is not how you measure bananas.

I was getting an abdominal ultrasound and the technician suddenly got really quiet, leaned closer to the screen, and whispered, 'You have a spectacularly photogenic spleen.'

I didn't even know how to respond. Thank you? Do I put it on my resume?

I live in Japan. After catching the flu and not eating anything for almost a week, the doctor told me that my cholesterol level was too low, and suggested I eat junk food to get it back up. I told him I was going back to the states in a few weeks, and he gave me a thumbs up and said "great!".

"Your breasts are the perfect ratio of fat, water and fibre."

Thanks, it's my own recipe.

I had an appointment with a neurologist for MRI results. He brought the images up on the screen and announced, "COR! You've got a lovely looking brain! Delicious!"

When my dad was being treated for bowel cancer, the consultant told him he had the prostate of a 30 year old. Baffled, my dad replied, "Should I give it back?" I don't know whether it was the stress or what, but I laughed so hard that I cried.

“Are you sure you’ve never given birth?”

Why yes. Very sure. I would remember that.

I was 13 and having really bad back pain. We went to an ortho and I had a back x-ray. The doctor looked at it and the first thing he said was, “You have the perfect birthing canal”. My mom and I were like 👀

I’m 27 now and have had 3 kids with no issues and the first OB checked me during early pregnancy and said I have the perfect shaped pelvis for a birth so guess he wasn’t wrong. Still very weird.

“I shared a picture of your kidney at a conference recently!”

It’s every girl’s dream to have her kidney shared at an endourology conference!

I have a very rare anatomical structure called a calyceal diverticulum, which is a pouch in my kidney that forms kidney stones. The stones can get stuck *twice* and we managed to get a picture of how my first stone got stuck right in the opening of the pouch… because I visited the ER in extreme pain three times.

It was a real money shot, and my endourologist is going to use it to educate students. He definitely wants to help me, but he also can barely contain his glee at my case.

I was 26 and went to an annual OB appointment. I asked about having my tubes tied as I didn’t intent to have children. He told me that as one of the “Good” ones (i.e. White), I needed to make sure there were enough of “us” in the world. For reference, this was in central Alabama. I asked him to explain what he meant. He said something to the effect of “You know. . “
I replied, “No, I don’t. What do you mean?”
He er-uhmed his way through the rest of the conversation. When I asked for a referral for the tubal ligation, he said to talk to the nurse and left the room. Never went back. 60 years old, do not have children.

A surgeon says to me, “Well, I make my living cutting people up, but I’m not recommending that you let me do it to you just so I can pay off my Porsche.”.

I had gallstones, but eating made me feel better instead of making me feel sick like it does for most people, so when the ER finally brought in a gastroenterologist to see me she didn't think that was what was wrong with me and started examining me. Then she poked my gallbladder and was like "Wow, it *flinched*!" And yes, I could feel it flinching. And yes, it was every bit as gross as you can imagine.

Then the surgeon got the resident surgeon in, and had her start poking it too, for educational purposes I guess, and the resident started marveling over it too. They were taking turns poking my gallbladder and making it jump around until I was just like "Hey, you're not in medical school anymore and I'm not a cadaver, stop doing that!!"

Gotta wonder how much fun they had catching the d**n thing when they took it out a few hours later . . .

"You have chlamydia...Oh, you've been married for 8 years and never had symptoms before? Yes, that is unusual."

Doc just sitting there waiting for me to connect the dots.

I had a nurse warn me that now that I'm transitioning, to be prepared for doctors to ignore me more often because statistically women tend to be misdiagnosed and ignored more frequently than men.

Which was weird to hear, and sad to learn.

"your child doesn't have a soul just lock him up." Dr told my mom in the 90s. My brother is on the spectrum.

I had a colonoscopy in my mid 60’s. Afterwards the doctor told me I had a “young colon.”
I was so proud.

My seven year old was stung on the face right above his lip by a bee. His face swelled up considerably- like Quasimodo. I took him to the urgent care and when the Dr walked in he looked at my son, shuddered and gave out a small involuntarily scream. Then he said “That’s why he’s here, right?”.

I was a student’s first ever pap smear and after I was dressed he put his hand on my shoulder, looked me in the eyes, and said “thank you” with more sincerity than I’ve heard from anyone before or since.

Sorry for setting you on fire.

I had a skin tag cut off my armpit - but he seemed to forget about pit-hair being flammable.

I was having a couple of moles removed on my back. While laying on my stomach, my Dr asks “do you like to fish”? I told him I do and he told me that I could take the moles home if I wanted because they make excellent bait.

Weird thing to say but, still to this day he was the best dr my husband and I ever had!

My hematologist came into my hospital room at 5 am as I was SLEEPING and started whispering in my ear, “I told you to go to the hospital, remember”. He, in fact, did NOT tell me to go to the hospital - he denied me a CT scan when I had several large pulmonary embolisms and required a week’s hospitalization. I reported him to the hospital, it was a whole thing and I never saw him again.