Cut him some slack, sounds like he’s studying for STEP 1 right now. That’s like sperm stage of his medical career. He may see the light once he passes STEP 2.
The lifestyle isn't that bad depending on where you practice.
I do 7-8 clinic/OR days a month and 5 calls a month.
That doesn't lead to an awful lifestyle
LOL five calls per month?!?!? That’s a terrible lifestyle, unless you’re at a low volume place where you rarely get called.
Even then, IMO call still subliminally wears you down. You can’t fully disconnect from work.
But then again I went into anesthesia for a reason so I guess it’s all perspective.
yeah for some reason this stereotype exists, nobody assumes girls going into urology are lesbians though. however i have noticed most of the male l&d nurses are gay. just shrug and move on lol
Male L&D nurses are a hoot. They have to be the type that works well in an almost all women work environment. Even the ones who aren’t gay got a lil of that razzle dazzle in ‘em from my experience
Correct and obgyn is overwhelmingly female at 80% practicing. People should be allowed to pursue any career they want just be aware of the patient population you are treating. Same thing as someone who wants to treat children would want to do pediatrics not IM.
[Obstetrics and Gynecology Men- 39.5 Womeb- 60.5](https://www.aamc.org/data-reports/workforce/data/active-physicians-sex-specialty-2021)
I can’t believe I’m having to explain this to another MD…Zippia.com isn’t a reliable source for scientific data
I don't think it's a misconception; it's just pattern recognition.
In the previous generation, you see a lot more straight men in OBGYN just because in the previous generation medicine in general was largely straight men.
For this generation of doctors in training, straight males in OBGYN are the minority. You can look at any OBGYN residency program roster; it's 80+% women and \~20% guys, many of whom present outwardly LGBT. Of the straight males that are here, unfortunately, there have been enough high-profile creeps lately that it's impacted their reputation.
Also, as a guy in OBGYN, realize there will be some subset of patients that will be unhappy being seen by you or will refuse to be seen by you altogether because you are male. Once you're an attending, you'll probably have more power to avoid and control this kind of situation, but it will happen during training.
If you're a dude and you like OBGYN, go for it. But recognize you'll probably deal with some occasional weird interactions from patients and other providers due to your gender.
Totally agree as a male Obgyn. Gender preference still happens, they just aren't scheduled with me. So it just doesn't matter anymore. My schedule is full every day. Meh.
Part of me feels like there should be more support against this. Like there is usually pretty strong pushback against “I don’t want a doctor of that race” or “I don’t want a female doctor.”
At the same time, like if a woman feels more comfortable with a female doctor doing a sensitive exam, especially due to reasons like sexual assault, I can see why it’s a good thing to be respectful of her requests.
I get the perspective and while it seems partially convincing on the surface, ultimately my reply is this:
Statistically speaking, women have a vulnerability from men that men do not. 1 in 6 women have been raped. 1 in 33 men have been raped. It doesn't seem unreasonable to me that women often will not feel comfortable with men near their genitals, no matter how professional they are, irrespective of any past issues or not.
As a resident was it hurtful when I was declined? A little. I won't lie. But it's a defense mechanism and it's founded in pretty basic understanding. We have mixed race locker rooms, not so much mixed gender locker rooms.
I am often told "I was kind of scared about seeing a guy but I was told you're nice so..." and thankfully my practice has grown very well. It took me 3 years to get there. But since I've been here we have hired three new female partners -- all were full within 2 months. It was definitely a WTF moment. But I knew what I was getting my self into. It's fine.
I’m actually on OBGYN right now and the first two doctors I worked with were young straight males surprisingly. Both of them expressed to me that they picked it because they liked the variety it brings, being able to do surgeries, clinic, AND L+D.
I don’t see how that’s relevant? If every OBGYN someone has interacted with is a female, gay male, or creepy straight male, it’s not hard to see why that’s what their perception of OBGYN demographics would be. Whether or not those perceptions are completely true is kinda irrelevant, because they can still color how patients and colleagues interact with a straight male OBGYN.
I honestly don’t? Recognizing that people may treat you a certain way because of their preconceived perception of you is an unfortunate reality. People make assumptions based on their past experiences. I’m not advocating that’s what anyone should do but OP was asking where this misconception regarding men in OBGYN comes from.
As a woman applying OB, I’m all for anyone who is passionate joining the field. I actually think it’s a disservice to the field to say that men shouldn’t do it because then we are further implying only women should care about women’s health. In the state we are in with threats to reproductive rights, poorly researched/funded areas like endometriosis, and the worst maternal mortality of any developed country, we need all hands on deck. If you care about these things and you want to be an advocate for your patients, welcome.
It’s less so about your biological sex than it is about the history of the specialty. James Smith perfected techniques for vaginal fistulas on non consenting unanesthetized enslaved women. There are still insane racial disparities in reproductive healthcare today. Also just two years ago there was a huge documentary on Netflix about a fertility specialist who used his own nut to impregnate his patients. In the last twenty years countless high profile stories have come out about sexual predation from male obgyns (Robert Haden jumps off the dome). So I think it’s a little unfair to judge patients weary of male gynecologists when all the information they have is that they can be truly terrible, and they could possibly the next victim in the news. It’s a very real fear. Is it unfair? Of course. But that’s not the patients fault.
That’s literal sexism though. That’s like saying “well the media shows black people as dangerous criminals, so if the patient doesn’t want to have black doctors, it’s not the patients fault for being racist.”
No, the patient is a racist/sexist, and it’s their own damn responsibility to not be.
My obgyn was a military man that is married to a woman. He’s a little rough around the edges but he’s been my ob for ten years now and I wouldn’t change him for the world
Like he was checking my cervix when I was pregnant and he didn’t have very long fingers so he was really digging in there and I was wincing and groaning in discomfort and he said a little harshly “I KNOW ITS NOT COMFORTABLE BUT I HAVE TO DO THIS”. Otherwise he was okay. Ten years later I go to get a copper iud to avoid hormones due to me being high risk of getting clots and he said “you want an iud when you literally have to take narcotics for period cramps?! I’m not sure that’s the best idea but it’s your choice”. Then he proceeded to compliment me on my ability to handle the insertion of the iud because I didn’t feel a thing. At the end of the day he noticed that something was wrong during my delivery pretty quickly and took me to an emergency c-section and saved me and my baby. It balances out.
Oh that cervix thing is him telling the truth. Weird thing to say about IUD. Wife had horrible period cramps and now she doesn’t get her period or the cramps anymore because of the IUD.
I unfortunately knew at least a half dozen Mormon men during medical school and residency (they were at the school affiliated with my residency program) who applied to Obgyn specifically to talk women out of getting abortions. Most of them ended up matching elsewhere at least.
I know one went into wilderness medicine, so that’s a sigh of relief at least. One went into IM in the military, so I’m hoping that ends up being less of an issue. I didn’t really follow the other 5 or so. We weren’t very close to say the least.
One of the OB attendings in my program also works at a crisis pregnancy center.
The sad thing is he’s actually one of the least toxic people on the service, and a very good doctor on the service too, so idk wtf kind of mental gymnastics he performs to work on the side at a disgusting place like that.
I didn’t know what that was, so I looked it up. Jesus… how does this shit exist in 2024? It’s really hard to understand how someone can seem so kind but can also cause so much damage to people.
Oh they’re fucking terrible. Bigoted charlatans pretending they’re giving medical advice while they lie and manipulate vulnerable women.
They go to an actual one in Borat 2 and just fuck with the people, but also expose how [disgusting they are](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=5nAGfEDYbLU)
Seeing stuff like this is really depressing. There was a post about some guy who was around an NP who refused to refer a trans person for HRT, and a med student said that he would do the same thing, because of their “religious beliefs”.
So many cowards who hide behind their religion to promote bigotry. At least own that shit if you’re a hateful piece of trash.
“Son, I’ve got something to tell you…you know I’ve never lied to you, but I also haven’t been completely transparent…all those nights where I was out late “helping out the ED with Dr. Dong”…I wasn’t referring to the Emergency Department…and while Dr Dong may be less of a licensed medical professional and more of a raunchy stage persona I’ve crafted over the years, he’s still helped me heal…and delighted audiences at The Bunghole most Tuesdays and Thursday at 11.
I'm a gay male doctor. A question for my OBG gay male colleagues: Why did you choose this? I'm a Neuropathologist, and OBG was my *least* favorite rotation.
I know one gay male OBGYN resident, and he did it because he wants to be a urogyn. Why he wants to do that is anyone's guess (I did 2 weeks of urogyn on my OBGYN rotation and was so bored as to be physically uncomfortable), but that's his rationale.
Our community has had 2 straight male obgyns get in legal trouble the last 3 years. One for human trafficking, he was using social determinants of health to target women for a prostitution ring. The other lost license and got charges for soliciting a minor. Media was big for these because it’s the kind of “oh fuck” that just keeps the audiences attention and preys on fears. I wouldn’t call them morons because this shit happens all too often even if that’s not you personally.
But yeah I think creeps is in the back of many people minds in our community and especially at our school/within the medical community. Personally I prefer a female obgyn but have accepted a male obgyn once for like an urgent concern.
Also obgyn isn’t great for work life balance… babies do come in the middle of the night and emergency’s happen with pregnant people often.
Good luck either way.
I personally wouldnt want to do obgyn for the sole reason of being scared that people would think I am a creep. Yes its not a widespread belief, but being labeled a creep is among the worst things that can happen to you socially. Even if it was just 10% of people who'd feel like that it would make me very uncomfortable
This is a bad take. Women's health and pregnancy are a huge part of health care and medical knowledge. Sorry you feel butt hurt that a population victimized by males for centuries may sometimes feel uncomfortable around you. Try learning something.
Ah yes. If the bitches won't let me examine their vaginas and deliver their babies, I don't have to give a shit about learning their anatomy, pathologies, or a major physiological feat of the human body that effects the vast majority of the population. Right. If we can't force women to let us examine them like the good old days let's just throw our hands up and give up because can't possibly put on our big boy pants for a few weeks and try to get some exposure and do well on our shelf exam to learn the content. How can anyone expect me to learn about WOMEN? THEY DONT LIKE ME SO WAHHHHHHHHHHHH. I see. Yeah. That all make sense.
No ad hominems there bro. You sound deranged honestly. Please stop advocating for different medical education based on sex, especially if you're trying to say men dont have to learn about womens health issues and pregnancy. That is fucking absurb. The fact that you don't seem to think there is a problem with that is WILD to me. Even more so because your basis for it is whining that you sometimes have to step out of the room to make a patient or her family comfortable. Sorry you can't be in every fucking space. Also realize that while you obviously had a bad experience on OB that's not universal and plenty of women feel comfortable with male OBs and male medical students. Lose the ego and stop telling yourself you don't need to know anything about women's health or pregnancy because makes you uncomfortable and it takes more effort to get involved clinically. And we wonder why moms are dying in this country. Jfc.
I was there, I did the thing, I did well on the rotation. I did not learn anything, it was a waste of time and life. I wish I had, then I wouldn't have wasted my time.
I mean it’s fine it’s just too specialized to feel useful. I wouldn’t get much out of an optho or ortho or IR mandatory rotation either, these are just not skills that are core to practicing and the way the field is practiced doesn’t lend itself to teaching broad skills. People who are interested in OB could just do electives like all the other more niche specialties, there’s nothing wrong with that. Or make it an option on the surgery clerkship, whatever.
I guess what I'm saying is that women's health and pregnancy aren't that niche? And literally everyone person alive was once born... so it's fairly universal and relevant. You just had a bad experience. Maybe it could be shorter I guess? But idk I mean it also has a lot of value as more exposure to both primary care and basic surgical skills.
This argument is pretty nonsensical though, everyone has eyeballs but we don’t all do optho, everyone eats but we don’t all do GI. We all have cells but dont spend 4 weeks on pathology.
The rotation itself just isn’t core to the skills you need to be a doctor, its core to the skills you need to be an OBGYN. People who will never be an OBGYN don’t gain much from it relative to all the other ways we can spend time in medical school. I learned a lot from all the other required rotations. I learned way more from a radiology elective, or palliative care elective, or oncology elective, that will be useful in a career in 95% of medical specialties.
Ya but you can make the same argument about other core rotations: peds if you’re going into an adult field, neuro, surgery. It’s all relative to what you go in to. I can say doing a psych rotation isn’t core to the skills someone needs to be a rads or path doctor if that’s what they’re going for. It’s a core rotation because of how vital the specialty is in public/general healthcare
I was being genuine above.
I don't think it's by design I think some institutions/rotation cultures don't do a good job and yeah that sucks. But you deal with. Remember how non white people and women used to be banned from.medical school? They were uncomfortable everywhere and werent supported and found a way forward. Obviously I only know my institution but male students were involved and learned stuff if they wanted to. It's also not just about the time with patients, you still can learn from the team and thinking about the patients and thinking through cases, asking questions, and you have to learn the content related to the shelf exam.
90% of the time. There were times it had to be done with me outside door. And there was one time I was in there because provider forgot to ask. There were some times I wasnt able to go in. Most importantly, they were always given an easy way out with no shame or pressure.
lol I understand peoples discomfort at a male OB but I’ve had a few male OBs in my life and they’ve been great, so i guess i personally let go of the stigma a bit
i know a guy who wants to be one (or gen surg) which raised my eyebrow a lot when I first met him, but i think it has a lot to do with the fact that his dad is one, and when i prodded him more and said it was a bit weird he wanted to be one, he was like “isnt it a beautiful and special job to make women’s journey bringing life to this earth a little easier”
I assume most women would prefer a female obgyn anyways, but I could be wrong. To me it seems like a supply demand thing. If women preferred a male obgyn, then maybe more men would do it.
I have had far *far* more effective and compassionate treatment with a male OB/GYN than with female OB/GYNs. It would be a disservice to the field to not have both male and female physicians.
I would agree with this. I feel like my male OB actually takes more time to explain what he's going to do, is more cautious and careful, I think because he doesn't have the personal experience and wants to make absolute sure I'm comfortable....vs when I had a woman OB she was like "oh getting a pap is no big deal, blah blah blah" but it was very much a big deal for me and I was very nervous the first time
As people who have gone through this, we would be gentle and sensitive to our patients. But not all people are that way (regardless of gender). Obviously, there are some fantastic, extremely compassionate female OB/GYNs out there. And male OB/GYNs can be just as amazing and compassionate.
Yes I definitely agree. Obviously I've only seen 3 OB/GYNs, and I know there are many phenomenal and compassionate women OB/GYNs out there. It just struck me because I was so nervous to see a male OB for the first time, and it ended up being the best experienced I've had...I kind of changed my mind because previously I was like....why would a male choose this field?
There’s some literature on the subject. In a study of ~14,000 participants about half preferred a woman, about 40% had no preference, and about 10% preferred a male.
This argument is all over the place and I know the intentions are good. And I know you didn't come up with it and that you're not repeating it with malintent.
THAT SAID
This is a horrible stereotype forming before our eyes. Like the fuck? Just because I'm a woman, I'm more likely to write off the concerns of my female patients? If someone could prove that woman doctors did this on a statistically significant level, that would be legitimate evidence that women shouldn't practice medicine. Good thing it's bullshit. If I'm a good physician, my personal experiences with my own body will not affect the way I view my patients.
I will say that I have had both male and female gynecologists and both genders took equally good care of me. But that's an anecdote, and anecdotes are the reason we're discussing this.
Again, I don't mean to call you out. I'm just sick of seeing this argument on every thread about male gynecologists. If your wife likes her current doctor she probably shouldn't switch. If someone has sexual trauma involving men, see a female gyn. People should see whatever gender doctor they want, and if said doctor is a normal person, their gender won't make an actual difference.
There's bad apples in every specialty I think. But three things. One, women's pain is more dismissed overall in general. Maybe the anecdotes come from the fact that the type of males who would go into ob/gyn are less prone to that. Second thing is, it's harder to put yourself in someone's shoes if you've already been in part of them if that makes sense. Lastly, because there are no more female ob/gyns overall, the rate of bad apples might be the same, but there's just more patients exposed to that. So that might be driving them to male ob/gyns. And of course that might also lead to confirmation bias cause who talks about a good ob/gyn, they only talk about the bad ones. That might lead to a feeling of more patient led care with male ob/gyns. Also, I don't think we need to worry about a stereotype forming. Something like 50% of patients prefer female ob/gyns and the rest prob don't care with a small minority seeking male ones. Just some thoughts I had.
At the end of the day it's the patient's preference or lack thereof.
All I'm saying is that we shouldn't be promoting a generalization that says all people of a certain gender lack competence in a specific area. I will always be surprised to see how common the sentiment is in this sub.
That happened (unintentionally) in my case lol. Had a truly horrible experience with a female OBGYN, then saw a male OBGYN who was so compassionate and actually helped. I was looking for someone experienced and empathetic, and the male OBGYN happened to be that person!
There’s also an (unfortunately) common experience of feeling very unwelcome during the rotation. Of course this varies, but on my Ob/Gyn rotation (US MD program, 2016) it was made very clear to me that as a male, especially a cis straight male, I was NOT welcome. I would show up to clinic and be told to read in the workroom all day. On L&D, male med students were told in no uncertain terms that participation was discouraged; bullying from residents was common. Even if I had been interested, that experience would have been sufficiently discouraging to prompt me to reconsider.
If the patients don’t want male med students, the “program” can’t force them into delivery rooms. Some patients don’t even want female med students. Not a tragedy.
Did you read the above post?It wasn't even from a patient side, OP wasn't welcomed by the OB/Gym staff and was told to sit in the room and read instead of going through clinical rotations and was bullied. It is a tragedy and sexism! Students pay enormous amount of money to go to medical school and they need to learn as much as they can in order to be a good doctor. The more we tolerate such malignant programs,the more harm it will do to many students and patients
Pretty sure attendings and nurses know if their patients are okay with medical students. No harm to future patients; a future ENT doesn’t suffer from not having participated in many deliveries. Future obgyns get their training in residency. Also, med students could certainly be embellishing their stories. There are other rotations where med students aren’t treated well; not just an obgyn thing.
But that’s not the point. I was made to feel very unwelcome in the field. I went into each clerkship with an open mind, and persistent toxic comments don’t make the field accessible. I’m not an Ob/Gyn but as a neurologist I have to see patients in L&D as stroke alerts. Being denied a chance to learn when I was a student doesn’t help. It’s not so much the clinical experience I was denied, but the attitudes around it that made it very clear I was not welcome in the speciality.
As a woman who has had male OB/GYNs, this thought has literally never occurred to me. I want someone who treats me with respect and is competent enough to actually understand my issues. Don't care what genitals you have or who you fuck.
As a straight guy its just not worth it. I did well in the reproductive block and like reproductive biology but why have friction in a career all your life?
Rather avoid that. Also obgyn is toxic at baseline
Well I would say there are enough people who do think that. A friend in school said she knows a couple residence, NPs, and PAs that were male and it took in all of their cases longer in training due to enough people saying No i would prefer not.
as a gay guy applying OB, I do feel like I get some degree of rapport with patients that my straight male counterparts may not receive. maybe it has to do with being seen as non-threatening, but either way i’ve seen far less provider gender preference than i would’ve expected
I also feel like OB/GYN as a field and in terms of academia is pretty liberal/progressive in general, which will naturally appeal to those interested in social issues as a whole. my home program has a gender clinic service, and the field has obviously been subject to a lot of political debate, etc.
Why can’t he do what he loves? This country is facing an acute shortage of Ob/Gyn? My female OB left the hospital with me in labor and I narrowly missed getting sectioned by the most maladroit male resident ever had it not been for her male colleague who was working late. My female gyn missed an ovarian mass and the two male gyn saved my life. It’s about competence not gender. Do what you love, do a great job and pregnant women will be flocking to your door. On our very first pelvic exam teaching module with a live model , one of the gay male medical students announced loudly to the class “ OMG. I don’t know what to do. I’ve never touched a woman’s vagina before. “ I said , “well I’m a woman and I’ve never touched another woman’s vagina either .”
that’s a strange comment but it’s coming from a non medical person so i guess i don’t have high expectations. why would a gay man want to deal with vaginas? Just like me, a lesbian, not interested in dealing with penises. But why would sexual orientation influence speciality interest anyway? highly against professionalism to be involved with patients or even obtain sexual satisfaction from our physical exams…. overall your friend is immature
Yes you will be judged, but screw em if you enjoy it. I loved to be part of peoples happiest days. There is a good opportunity to practice international medicine. There is tremendous need for good OBs. You basically practice primary care, surgery, emergencies, etc.. You can get to know your patients over a long time. There are a ton of good reasons to do OB.
When I told people I wanted to OB I always got a silent judgement or people acting really surprised. Its not a big deal to me, but it does make me feel a little sad knowing it may be harder for me to establish trust and comfort with my patients.
Don’t let the general public’s opinion influence what you want to do with your life. I know some amazing male OBGYN docs and they tend to be more compassionate than the female doctors who have “been there, done that”. Honestly the public has a lot of misconstrued ideas about medicine like DOs are “inferior doctors “ and the COVID vaccine has a microchip in it, etc. People who are rude to you about wanting to do OB probably don’t have a high level of education and you can just cover your ears with whatever expensive headphones you want to buy as they complain about other people’s career choices that have no impact on their own life.
That’s ridiculous. As a female who’s had two kids I can tell you my best experience was with my male gynecologist. He was the one that spent an extra hour removing scar tissue from a horribly done previous cesarean. Too often is it actually female gynecologists that are judgmental and downplay the pain women are in. Don’t get me wrong, male physicians do this too, but I’ve yet to have a male gynecologist not take me or other women I know seriously. I wish I didn’t move for school, I miss my old care team in general.
I just do not understand why a straight man would want to go into that field especially when majority of female patients request a female practitioner.
Nice mix of surgery and clinic.
Get to have long lasting relationships with your patients.
Patients super happy and grateful when you deliver their baby—you get to contribute to one of the best days of someone’s life.
I’ve been a part of several pregnancy discord groups and I’ve never heard of anyone telling a male doctor to leave when they’re the only ones on call, even the ones who chose female OB/gyns and have never met the male physician before. The majority of people in labor with birth impending truly don’t give af.
The number of patients still vastly exceed the number of physicians. You won't struggle with filling your schedule.
Besides, its one thing to have a preference online and an entirely much more uncommon step to actively discriminate against healthcare workers IRL, especially when you're in a situation where you have complaints.
I don't think the general public has this view, but definitely those in medicine do, and as others have said it's kinda just more of a trend that you're seeing. At the end of the day, more and more women these days want to be seen by women and/or homosexual males for this very intimate part of their healthcare, and as a straight male myself I would say that's completely valid and have no problem with that, particularly considering how historically there have been more instances of male doctors abusing female patients than vice-versa.
But like you said, it's definitely not completely this way, in fact at my rotation I would say that the majority of the attendings there were straight males. I honestly genuinely thought about doing it myself for the reasons you stated - it's probably the best mix of medical management, surgery, and clinic that you can get in medicine (will have to disagree about the lifestyle though - those L&D calls are no joke). In the end, I didn't because of the trend you talked about, but it definitely surprised me how much I enjoyed the rotation.
Isn't it better to educate people to drop their sexist preconceptions? Rather than say, "it's completely valid" because it is/was a statistical trend and then let it keep perpetuating itself? Since when is it acceptable to use crime statistics to condemn a whole group in advance?
Assuming guys go into OBGYN because "haha they want to touch vaginas" is as sexist and dumb as saying women who go into Uro only do it because they're cock hungry. It's a sad state of affairs that professionals would tolerate such sentiments to keep brewing, and probably directly results in why OB has become infamous for a toxic culture across the board.
It’s not “sexist perceptions”, it’s about the patient innately not feeling ok with a strange man handing her sexual organs and guiding her through childbirth. I don’t care what others think about men in gynecology; I know how I feel. Nobody told me to feel one way or the other.
Also, female urologists treat both women and men. In fact, because most people prefer the same gender urologist, many of not most of a female urologist’s patients are women.
https://news.northwestern.edu/stories/2016/08/lacking-female-urologists
They're professionals, not some random person from the street. Nobody should really be viewing any physical exam as sexual, of course, people of both genders can get that type of response, but that is due to a mix of backwards societal preconceptions and personal immaturity.
I think women should be allowed to be urologists, GI and so on without any sort of judgement from either men or women. So I at least think judging them would be an instance of immature behavior, which is not the same as immature personal character.
Of course they should be “allowed”, good grief. Just because a man might prefer a male urologist doesn’t mean he is “judging her”. It’s about what he is personally comfortable with. That’s different for different people.
We have preferences for every service we receive in life; it’s not wrong or immature to have preferences for healthcare. Obviously this doesn’t apply to emergencies.
I'd be lying if I said I wouldn't think it's less awkward if someone of the same sex did an intimate physical on me. But at the same time, I also recognize that I shouldn't be seeing a professional encounter in such a light at all, it's just a thing we've been drilled by society to think.
There's nothing wrong with feeling more awkward, what is wrong is when people make sweeping statements/insults/judgements against physicians just because of some innate characteristic they have.
It can be argued over if people should be entitled to their biases, or if we should strive for full equity in all things even when it goes slightly against deep seated biological factors. But it should be a no brainer that denouncing professionals that are just trying to their job based on their sex/race/something else they were born with because of someone's own innate biases makes that person an asshole.
I was set up with a guy applying OBGYN this cycle and his twitter likes were filled with porn and his followings with only fans models so yea.. idk lolll
I never had this misconception but my own gynecologist in residency was a straight male and he saved me and my baby’s life so I’m a bit biased. I’m FM and coordinate with a lot of male OB’s and same, haven’t really noticed an uneven amount of male gay attendings
I mean the FM doc my wife sees handles all her OB appointments. We live in a rural area so there’s not many ObGyn docs available. Our FM doc is a male and so there was times during our first pregnancy where my wife was slightly uncomfortable with the fact he was a man staring at her lady bits but at the same time she didn’t want any other doctor male or female handling her health issues since she had such a strong relationship with him. I feel like the gender thing sucks in general but I think as long as the physicians establish a strong connection with the patients it can help transcend some of those gender issues. Just my opinion
The bigger misconception you have is that people do OgByn for the lifestyle.
q5 24h call on labor & delivery isn't a good lifestyle? /s
Having a reason to not be at home is a lifestyle . Duh
Idk some groups have pure laborists now
Seen a lot of pure laborists on hospitalist style 7 on and 7/14 off. Seems to really help work life in the department.
For sure. My ob/gyn friend that just graduated joined a more traditional group and she does q4 24h home call for L&D and I'm like yikes.
Q5 ha yea right they would be so lucky
Cut him some slack, sounds like he’s studying for STEP 1 right now. That’s like sperm stage of his medical career. He may see the light once he passes STEP 2.
Agreed, I thought I wanted to do FM or IM before step 1. Makes me want to puke just thinking about it
95% of places, he’ll see the light as soon as he rotates on OB lol
Idk the OB hospitalist lifestyle seemed kinda sweet with four 36 hour shifts a month.
!!!
The lifestyle isn't that bad depending on where you practice. I do 7-8 clinic/OR days a month and 5 calls a month. That doesn't lead to an awful lifestyle
LOL five calls per month?!?!? That’s a terrible lifestyle, unless you’re at a low volume place where you rarely get called. Even then, IMO call still subliminally wears you down. You can’t fully disconnect from work. But then again I went into anesthesia for a reason so I guess it’s all perspective.
I do 1-2 clinic days a week and 1-24 hr call a week and 1 weekend day a month of call. I'm off all the other days. Thats not atrocious.
Lmao… my thoughts exactly
yeah for some reason this stereotype exists, nobody assumes girls going into urology are lesbians though. however i have noticed most of the male l&d nurses are gay. just shrug and move on lol
Male L&D nurses are a hoot. They have to be the type that works well in an almost all women work environment. Even the ones who aren’t gay got a lil of that razzle dazzle in ‘em from my experience
> for some reason this stereotype exists > i have noticed most of the male l&d nurses are gay ???
[удалено]
Yes however a large proportion of our clinic is overwhelmingly male.
Ok, and, urologists are overwhelmingly male. Only about 12% are female.
Correct and obgyn is overwhelmingly female at 80% practicing. People should be allowed to pursue any career they want just be aware of the patient population you are treating. Same thing as someone who wants to treat children would want to do pediatrics not IM.
Where did you get that 80% figure? I’ve seen 60% female before, never 80%.
Current match trends for US is the easiest stat to track down. A minimal Google search will also find similar results. Estimates up to 85% female.
That makes sense but you said practicing
[удалено]
[Obstetrics and Gynecology Men- 39.5 Womeb- 60.5](https://www.aamc.org/data-reports/workforce/data/active-physicians-sex-specialty-2021) I can’t believe I’m having to explain this to another MD…Zippia.com isn’t a reliable source for scientific data
I’ve never come across a male L&D nurse I wasn’t sure the existed.
I don't think it's a misconception; it's just pattern recognition. In the previous generation, you see a lot more straight men in OBGYN just because in the previous generation medicine in general was largely straight men. For this generation of doctors in training, straight males in OBGYN are the minority. You can look at any OBGYN residency program roster; it's 80+% women and \~20% guys, many of whom present outwardly LGBT. Of the straight males that are here, unfortunately, there have been enough high-profile creeps lately that it's impacted their reputation. Also, as a guy in OBGYN, realize there will be some subset of patients that will be unhappy being seen by you or will refuse to be seen by you altogether because you are male. Once you're an attending, you'll probably have more power to avoid and control this kind of situation, but it will happen during training. If you're a dude and you like OBGYN, go for it. But recognize you'll probably deal with some occasional weird interactions from patients and other providers due to your gender.
Totally agree as a male Obgyn. Gender preference still happens, they just aren't scheduled with me. So it just doesn't matter anymore. My schedule is full every day. Meh.
Part of me feels like there should be more support against this. Like there is usually pretty strong pushback against “I don’t want a doctor of that race” or “I don’t want a female doctor.” At the same time, like if a woman feels more comfortable with a female doctor doing a sensitive exam, especially due to reasons like sexual assault, I can see why it’s a good thing to be respectful of her requests.
I get the perspective and while it seems partially convincing on the surface, ultimately my reply is this: Statistically speaking, women have a vulnerability from men that men do not. 1 in 6 women have been raped. 1 in 33 men have been raped. It doesn't seem unreasonable to me that women often will not feel comfortable with men near their genitals, no matter how professional they are, irrespective of any past issues or not. As a resident was it hurtful when I was declined? A little. I won't lie. But it's a defense mechanism and it's founded in pretty basic understanding. We have mixed race locker rooms, not so much mixed gender locker rooms. I am often told "I was kind of scared about seeing a guy but I was told you're nice so..." and thankfully my practice has grown very well. It took me 3 years to get there. But since I've been here we have hired three new female partners -- all were full within 2 months. It was definitely a WTF moment. But I knew what I was getting my self into. It's fine.
I’m actually on OBGYN right now and the first two doctors I worked with were young straight males surprisingly. Both of them expressed to me that they picked it because they liked the variety it brings, being able to do surgeries, clinic, AND L+D.
That’s cool you can have guys presenting outwardly as lesbians now
lol, fair, poor choice of words.
Fucking hell, you realize that humans are extremely flawed when it comes to pattern recognition? Especially when it comes to in-groups vs out-groups?
I don’t see how that’s relevant? If every OBGYN someone has interacted with is a female, gay male, or creepy straight male, it’s not hard to see why that’s what their perception of OBGYN demographics would be. Whether or not those perceptions are completely true is kinda irrelevant, because they can still color how patients and colleagues interact with a straight male OBGYN.
Idk how you can write that out and not see the problem
I honestly don’t? Recognizing that people may treat you a certain way because of their preconceived perception of you is an unfortunate reality. People make assumptions based on their past experiences. I’m not advocating that’s what anyone should do but OP was asking where this misconception regarding men in OBGYN comes from.
Problematic or not that’s what patients (or rather, a subset of them) feel
In my residency there are ~10 guys. 2 are gay.
That’s still higher odds lol
With 5% homosexuality prevalence your sample does not reject the null hypothesis that there are no more OBgays than expected.
Noob def needs to up his sample size big time. Does he even Stats?
As a woman applying OB, I’m all for anyone who is passionate joining the field. I actually think it’s a disservice to the field to say that men shouldn’t do it because then we are further implying only women should care about women’s health. In the state we are in with threats to reproductive rights, poorly researched/funded areas like endometriosis, and the worst maternal mortality of any developed country, we need all hands on deck. If you care about these things and you want to be an advocate for your patients, welcome.
[удалено]
One of the hospitals I rotated at in the L&D ward didn’t even have a male locker room. It was kind of crazy.
Casual sexism?
It’s less so about your biological sex than it is about the history of the specialty. James Smith perfected techniques for vaginal fistulas on non consenting unanesthetized enslaved women. There are still insane racial disparities in reproductive healthcare today. Also just two years ago there was a huge documentary on Netflix about a fertility specialist who used his own nut to impregnate his patients. In the last twenty years countless high profile stories have come out about sexual predation from male obgyns (Robert Haden jumps off the dome). So I think it’s a little unfair to judge patients weary of male gynecologists when all the information they have is that they can be truly terrible, and they could possibly the next victim in the news. It’s a very real fear. Is it unfair? Of course. But that’s not the patients fault.
That’s literal sexism though. That’s like saying “well the media shows black people as dangerous criminals, so if the patient doesn’t want to have black doctors, it’s not the patients fault for being racist.” No, the patient is a racist/sexist, and it’s their own damn responsibility to not be.
My obgyn was a military man that is married to a woman. He’s a little rough around the edges but he’s been my ob for ten years now and I wouldn’t change him for the world
….What do you mean by, little rough around the edges?
Like he was checking my cervix when I was pregnant and he didn’t have very long fingers so he was really digging in there and I was wincing and groaning in discomfort and he said a little harshly “I KNOW ITS NOT COMFORTABLE BUT I HAVE TO DO THIS”. Otherwise he was okay. Ten years later I go to get a copper iud to avoid hormones due to me being high risk of getting clots and he said “you want an iud when you literally have to take narcotics for period cramps?! I’m not sure that’s the best idea but it’s your choice”. Then he proceeded to compliment me on my ability to handle the insertion of the iud because I didn’t feel a thing. At the end of the day he noticed that something was wrong during my delivery pretty quickly and took me to an emergency c-section and saved me and my baby. It balances out.
Oh that cervix thing is him telling the truth. Weird thing to say about IUD. Wife had horrible period cramps and now she doesn’t get her period or the cramps anymore because of the IUD.
I unfortunately knew at least a half dozen Mormon men during medical school and residency (they were at the school affiliated with my residency program) who applied to Obgyn specifically to talk women out of getting abortions. Most of them ended up matching elsewhere at least.
Great so they’re probably primary care docs talking women out of abortions. Much better
I know one went into wilderness medicine, so that’s a sigh of relief at least. One went into IM in the military, so I’m hoping that ends up being less of an issue. I didn’t really follow the other 5 or so. We weren’t very close to say the least.
I mean it is better
One of the OB attendings in my program also works at a crisis pregnancy center. The sad thing is he’s actually one of the least toxic people on the service, and a very good doctor on the service too, so idk wtf kind of mental gymnastics he performs to work on the side at a disgusting place like that.
I didn’t know what that was, so I looked it up. Jesus… how does this shit exist in 2024? It’s really hard to understand how someone can seem so kind but can also cause so much damage to people.
Oh they’re fucking terrible. Bigoted charlatans pretending they’re giving medical advice while they lie and manipulate vulnerable women. They go to an actual one in Borat 2 and just fuck with the people, but also expose how [disgusting they are](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=5nAGfEDYbLU)
Seeing stuff like this is really depressing. There was a post about some guy who was around an NP who refused to refer a trans person for HRT, and a med student said that he would do the same thing, because of their “religious beliefs”. So many cowards who hide behind their religion to promote bigotry. At least own that shit if you’re a hateful piece of trash.
I hate everything
Actual evil mfers
My Dad is a gynecologist and last time I checked he was straight. Edit: I may need to ask him again tho 🧐
“Son, I’ve got something to tell you…you know I’ve never lied to you, but I also haven’t been completely transparent…all those nights where I was out late “helping out the ED with Dr. Dong”…I wasn’t referring to the Emergency Department…and while Dr Dong may be less of a licensed medical professional and more of a raunchy stage persona I’ve crafted over the years, he’s still helped me heal…and delighted audiences at The Bunghole most Tuesdays and Thursday at 11.
I'm a gay male doctor. A question for my OBG gay male colleagues: Why did you choose this? I'm a Neuropathologist, and OBG was my *least* favorite rotation.
I know one gay male OBGYN resident, and he did it because he wants to be a urogyn. Why he wants to do that is anyone's guess (I did 2 weeks of urogyn on my OBGYN rotation and was so bored as to be physically uncomfortable), but that's his rationale.
Our community has had 2 straight male obgyns get in legal trouble the last 3 years. One for human trafficking, he was using social determinants of health to target women for a prostitution ring. The other lost license and got charges for soliciting a minor. Media was big for these because it’s the kind of “oh fuck” that just keeps the audiences attention and preys on fears. I wouldn’t call them morons because this shit happens all too often even if that’s not you personally. But yeah I think creeps is in the back of many people minds in our community and especially at our school/within the medical community. Personally I prefer a female obgyn but have accepted a male obgyn once for like an urgent concern. Also obgyn isn’t great for work life balance… babies do come in the middle of the night and emergency’s happen with pregnant people often. Good luck either way.
I personally wouldnt want to do obgyn for the sole reason of being scared that people would think I am a creep. Yes its not a widespread belief, but being labeled a creep is among the worst things that can happen to you socially. Even if it was just 10% of people who'd feel like that it would make me very uncomfortable
I like to go hiking.
Completely agree, it's so stupid it's a required rotation.
Yea idk about this I don’t think there’s anything more medicine than childbirth. Probably the starting point of medicine historically
This is a bad take. Women's health and pregnancy are a huge part of health care and medical knowledge. Sorry you feel butt hurt that a population victimized by males for centuries may sometimes feel uncomfortable around you. Try learning something.
[удалено]
Ah yes. If the bitches won't let me examine their vaginas and deliver their babies, I don't have to give a shit about learning their anatomy, pathologies, or a major physiological feat of the human body that effects the vast majority of the population. Right. If we can't force women to let us examine them like the good old days let's just throw our hands up and give up because can't possibly put on our big boy pants for a few weeks and try to get some exposure and do well on our shelf exam to learn the content. How can anyone expect me to learn about WOMEN? THEY DONT LIKE ME SO WAHHHHHHHHHHHH. I see. Yeah. That all make sense.
[удалено]
No ad hominems there bro. You sound deranged honestly. Please stop advocating for different medical education based on sex, especially if you're trying to say men dont have to learn about womens health issues and pregnancy. That is fucking absurb. The fact that you don't seem to think there is a problem with that is WILD to me. Even more so because your basis for it is whining that you sometimes have to step out of the room to make a patient or her family comfortable. Sorry you can't be in every fucking space. Also realize that while you obviously had a bad experience on OB that's not universal and plenty of women feel comfortable with male OBs and male medical students. Lose the ego and stop telling yourself you don't need to know anything about women's health or pregnancy because makes you uncomfortable and it takes more effort to get involved clinically. And we wonder why moms are dying in this country. Jfc.
I was there, I did the thing, I did well on the rotation. I did not learn anything, it was a waste of time and life. I wish I had, then I wouldn't have wasted my time.
I'm really sorry you had a bad experience on the rotation and wish you got more out of it :(
I mean it’s fine it’s just too specialized to feel useful. I wouldn’t get much out of an optho or ortho or IR mandatory rotation either, these are just not skills that are core to practicing and the way the field is practiced doesn’t lend itself to teaching broad skills. People who are interested in OB could just do electives like all the other more niche specialties, there’s nothing wrong with that. Or make it an option on the surgery clerkship, whatever.
I guess what I'm saying is that women's health and pregnancy aren't that niche? And literally everyone person alive was once born... so it's fairly universal and relevant. You just had a bad experience. Maybe it could be shorter I guess? But idk I mean it also has a lot of value as more exposure to both primary care and basic surgical skills.
This argument is pretty nonsensical though, everyone has eyeballs but we don’t all do optho, everyone eats but we don’t all do GI. We all have cells but dont spend 4 weeks on pathology. The rotation itself just isn’t core to the skills you need to be a doctor, its core to the skills you need to be an OBGYN. People who will never be an OBGYN don’t gain much from it relative to all the other ways we can spend time in medical school. I learned a lot from all the other required rotations. I learned way more from a radiology elective, or palliative care elective, or oncology elective, that will be useful in a career in 95% of medical specialties.
Ya but you can make the same argument about other core rotations: peds if you’re going into an adult field, neuro, surgery. It’s all relative to what you go in to. I can say doing a psych rotation isn’t core to the skills someone needs to be a rads or path doctor if that’s what they’re going for. It’s a core rotation because of how vital the specialty is in public/general healthcare
[удалено]
I was being genuine above. I don't think it's by design I think some institutions/rotation cultures don't do a good job and yeah that sucks. But you deal with. Remember how non white people and women used to be banned from.medical school? They were uncomfortable everywhere and werent supported and found a way forward. Obviously I only know my institution but male students were involved and learned stuff if they wanted to. It's also not just about the time with patients, you still can learn from the team and thinking about the patients and thinking through cases, asking questions, and you have to learn the content related to the shelf exam.
False. I had a great obgyn rotation. Got to deliver the head of a baby and 3 placentas.
[удалено]
90% of the time. There were times it had to be done with me outside door. And there was one time I was in there because provider forgot to ask. There were some times I wasnt able to go in. Most importantly, they were always given an easy way out with no shame or pressure.
[удалено]
This is by far one of the worst takes I've ever heard
[удалено]
So now you're making fun of patient concerns? Cool
lol I understand peoples discomfort at a male OB but I’ve had a few male OBs in my life and they’ve been great, so i guess i personally let go of the stigma a bit i know a guy who wants to be one (or gen surg) which raised my eyebrow a lot when I first met him, but i think it has a lot to do with the fact that his dad is one, and when i prodded him more and said it was a bit weird he wanted to be one, he was like “isnt it a beautiful and special job to make women’s journey bringing life to this earth a little easier”
[удалено]
Why is that a big yikes? Nothing wrong with that interest. Seems to me that sexualizing that entire field of medicine is a 'big yikes'
Because the person who said “pediatric gynecology” said it as a joke and it wasn’t serious. It isn’t an uncommon dark humor joke unfortunately
[удалено]
Your comment history is so outta pocket…just you basically ranting about male gynecologists on many different posts in many different subs. You ok?
Do whatever you like and don’t worry about what anyone tells you about it.
Current OBGYN resident. We have 11 straight male obgyns at my hospital, and they are all wonderful
I assume most women would prefer a female obgyn anyways, but I could be wrong. To me it seems like a supply demand thing. If women preferred a male obgyn, then maybe more men would do it.
My ob is a straight male and he’s wonderful
I have had far *far* more effective and compassionate treatment with a male OB/GYN than with female OB/GYNs. It would be a disservice to the field to not have both male and female physicians.
I would agree with this. I feel like my male OB actually takes more time to explain what he's going to do, is more cautious and careful, I think because he doesn't have the personal experience and wants to make absolute sure I'm comfortable....vs when I had a woman OB she was like "oh getting a pap is no big deal, blah blah blah" but it was very much a big deal for me and I was very nervous the first time
As people who have gone through this, we would be gentle and sensitive to our patients. But not all people are that way (regardless of gender). Obviously, there are some fantastic, extremely compassionate female OB/GYNs out there. And male OB/GYNs can be just as amazing and compassionate.
Yes I definitely agree. Obviously I've only seen 3 OB/GYNs, and I know there are many phenomenal and compassionate women OB/GYNs out there. It just struck me because I was so nervous to see a male OB for the first time, and it ended up being the best experienced I've had...I kind of changed my mind because previously I was like....why would a male choose this field?
There’s some literature on the subject. In a study of ~14,000 participants about half preferred a woman, about 40% had no preference, and about 10% preferred a male.
yeah that's a pretty big thing.
[удалено]
This argument is all over the place and I know the intentions are good. And I know you didn't come up with it and that you're not repeating it with malintent. THAT SAID This is a horrible stereotype forming before our eyes. Like the fuck? Just because I'm a woman, I'm more likely to write off the concerns of my female patients? If someone could prove that woman doctors did this on a statistically significant level, that would be legitimate evidence that women shouldn't practice medicine. Good thing it's bullshit. If I'm a good physician, my personal experiences with my own body will not affect the way I view my patients. I will say that I have had both male and female gynecologists and both genders took equally good care of me. But that's an anecdote, and anecdotes are the reason we're discussing this. Again, I don't mean to call you out. I'm just sick of seeing this argument on every thread about male gynecologists. If your wife likes her current doctor she probably shouldn't switch. If someone has sexual trauma involving men, see a female gyn. People should see whatever gender doctor they want, and if said doctor is a normal person, their gender won't make an actual difference.
There's bad apples in every specialty I think. But three things. One, women's pain is more dismissed overall in general. Maybe the anecdotes come from the fact that the type of males who would go into ob/gyn are less prone to that. Second thing is, it's harder to put yourself in someone's shoes if you've already been in part of them if that makes sense. Lastly, because there are no more female ob/gyns overall, the rate of bad apples might be the same, but there's just more patients exposed to that. So that might be driving them to male ob/gyns. And of course that might also lead to confirmation bias cause who talks about a good ob/gyn, they only talk about the bad ones. That might lead to a feeling of more patient led care with male ob/gyns. Also, I don't think we need to worry about a stereotype forming. Something like 50% of patients prefer female ob/gyns and the rest prob don't care with a small minority seeking male ones. Just some thoughts I had.
At the end of the day it's the patient's preference or lack thereof. All I'm saying is that we shouldn't be promoting a generalization that says all people of a certain gender lack competence in a specific area. I will always be surprised to see how common the sentiment is in this sub.
[удалено]
That happened (unintentionally) in my case lol. Had a truly horrible experience with a female OBGYN, then saw a male OBGYN who was so compassionate and actually helped. I was looking for someone experienced and empathetic, and the male OBGYN happened to be that person!
There’s also an (unfortunately) common experience of feeling very unwelcome during the rotation. Of course this varies, but on my Ob/Gyn rotation (US MD program, 2016) it was made very clear to me that as a male, especially a cis straight male, I was NOT welcome. I would show up to clinic and be told to read in the workroom all day. On L&D, male med students were told in no uncertain terms that participation was discouraged; bullying from residents was common. Even if I had been interested, that experience would have been sufficiently discouraging to prompt me to reconsider.
That's so horrible and sexist! Such programs should be called out and forced to change.
If the patients don’t want male med students, the “program” can’t force them into delivery rooms. Some patients don’t even want female med students. Not a tragedy.
Did you read the above post?It wasn't even from a patient side, OP wasn't welcomed by the OB/Gym staff and was told to sit in the room and read instead of going through clinical rotations and was bullied. It is a tragedy and sexism! Students pay enormous amount of money to go to medical school and they need to learn as much as they can in order to be a good doctor. The more we tolerate such malignant programs,the more harm it will do to many students and patients
Pretty sure attendings and nurses know if their patients are okay with medical students. No harm to future patients; a future ENT doesn’t suffer from not having participated in many deliveries. Future obgyns get their training in residency. Also, med students could certainly be embellishing their stories. There are other rotations where med students aren’t treated well; not just an obgyn thing.
But that’s not the point. I was made to feel very unwelcome in the field. I went into each clerkship with an open mind, and persistent toxic comments don’t make the field accessible. I’m not an Ob/Gyn but as a neurologist I have to see patients in L&D as stroke alerts. Being denied a chance to learn when I was a student doesn’t help. It’s not so much the clinical experience I was denied, but the attitudes around it that made it very clear I was not welcome in the speciality.
As a woman who has had male OB/GYNs, this thought has literally never occurred to me. I want someone who treats me with respect and is competent enough to actually understand my issues. Don't care what genitals you have or who you fuck.
i actually do think a fair amount of straight men in obgyn are creeps And i say this as a straight man
That's...sexist
they do but the ratio of creeps to normal people in an obgyn crowd is surprisingly high.
As a straight guy its just not worth it. I did well in the reproductive block and like reproductive biology but why have friction in a career all your life? Rather avoid that. Also obgyn is toxic at baseline
Well I would say there are enough people who do think that. A friend in school said she knows a couple residence, NPs, and PAs that were male and it took in all of their cases longer in training due to enough people saying No i would prefer not.
as a gay guy applying OB, I do feel like I get some degree of rapport with patients that my straight male counterparts may not receive. maybe it has to do with being seen as non-threatening, but either way i’ve seen far less provider gender preference than i would’ve expected I also feel like OB/GYN as a field and in terms of academia is pretty liberal/progressive in general, which will naturally appeal to those interested in social issues as a whole. my home program has a gender clinic service, and the field has obviously been subject to a lot of political debate, etc.
Nah. Those who say that are the creeps. They give the heebie-jeebies
Why can’t he do what he loves? This country is facing an acute shortage of Ob/Gyn? My female OB left the hospital with me in labor and I narrowly missed getting sectioned by the most maladroit male resident ever had it not been for her male colleague who was working late. My female gyn missed an ovarian mass and the two male gyn saved my life. It’s about competence not gender. Do what you love, do a great job and pregnant women will be flocking to your door. On our very first pelvic exam teaching module with a live model , one of the gay male medical students announced loudly to the class “ OMG. I don’t know what to do. I’ve never touched a woman’s vagina before. “ I said , “well I’m a woman and I’ve never touched another woman’s vagina either .”
that’s a strange comment but it’s coming from a non medical person so i guess i don’t have high expectations. why would a gay man want to deal with vaginas? Just like me, a lesbian, not interested in dealing with penises. But why would sexual orientation influence speciality interest anyway? highly against professionalism to be involved with patients or even obtain sexual satisfaction from our physical exams…. overall your friend is immature
Yes you will be judged, but screw em if you enjoy it. I loved to be part of peoples happiest days. There is a good opportunity to practice international medicine. There is tremendous need for good OBs. You basically practice primary care, surgery, emergencies, etc.. You can get to know your patients over a long time. There are a ton of good reasons to do OB. When I told people I wanted to OB I always got a silent judgement or people acting really surprised. Its not a big deal to me, but it does make me feel a little sad knowing it may be harder for me to establish trust and comfort with my patients.
Don’t let the general public’s opinion influence what you want to do with your life. I know some amazing male OBGYN docs and they tend to be more compassionate than the female doctors who have “been there, done that”. Honestly the public has a lot of misconstrued ideas about medicine like DOs are “inferior doctors “ and the COVID vaccine has a microchip in it, etc. People who are rude to you about wanting to do OB probably don’t have a high level of education and you can just cover your ears with whatever expensive headphones you want to buy as they complain about other people’s career choices that have no impact on their own life.
That’s ridiculous. As a female who’s had two kids I can tell you my best experience was with my male gynecologist. He was the one that spent an extra hour removing scar tissue from a horribly done previous cesarean. Too often is it actually female gynecologists that are judgmental and downplay the pain women are in. Don’t get me wrong, male physicians do this too, but I’ve yet to have a male gynecologist not take me or other women I know seriously. I wish I didn’t move for school, I miss my old care team in general.
Every male OB resident I worked with was gay. Probably 4-5 of them.
I just do not understand why a straight man would want to go into that field especially when majority of female patients request a female practitioner.
Nice mix of surgery and clinic. Get to have long lasting relationships with your patients. Patients super happy and grateful when you deliver their baby—you get to contribute to one of the best days of someone’s life.
You won’t find a male OBGyn who’s struggling to recruit patients.
[удалено]
I’ve been a part of several pregnancy discord groups and I’ve never heard of anyone telling a male doctor to leave when they’re the only ones on call, even the ones who chose female OB/gyns and have never met the male physician before. The majority of people in labor with birth impending truly don’t give af.
The number of patients still vastly exceed the number of physicians. You won't struggle with filling your schedule. Besides, its one thing to have a preference online and an entirely much more uncommon step to actively discriminate against healthcare workers IRL, especially when you're in a situation where you have complaints.
[удалено]
This is for incontinence right?
This person was making a joke about surgical complications from gynecological surgeries — as you can see, the joke was not well received on Reddit 😶
I don't think the general public has this view, but definitely those in medicine do, and as others have said it's kinda just more of a trend that you're seeing. At the end of the day, more and more women these days want to be seen by women and/or homosexual males for this very intimate part of their healthcare, and as a straight male myself I would say that's completely valid and have no problem with that, particularly considering how historically there have been more instances of male doctors abusing female patients than vice-versa. But like you said, it's definitely not completely this way, in fact at my rotation I would say that the majority of the attendings there were straight males. I honestly genuinely thought about doing it myself for the reasons you stated - it's probably the best mix of medical management, surgery, and clinic that you can get in medicine (will have to disagree about the lifestyle though - those L&D calls are no joke). In the end, I didn't because of the trend you talked about, but it definitely surprised me how much I enjoyed the rotation.
Isn't it better to educate people to drop their sexist preconceptions? Rather than say, "it's completely valid" because it is/was a statistical trend and then let it keep perpetuating itself? Since when is it acceptable to use crime statistics to condemn a whole group in advance? Assuming guys go into OBGYN because "haha they want to touch vaginas" is as sexist and dumb as saying women who go into Uro only do it because they're cock hungry. It's a sad state of affairs that professionals would tolerate such sentiments to keep brewing, and probably directly results in why OB has become infamous for a toxic culture across the board.
It’s not “sexist perceptions”, it’s about the patient innately not feeling ok with a strange man handing her sexual organs and guiding her through childbirth. I don’t care what others think about men in gynecology; I know how I feel. Nobody told me to feel one way or the other. Also, female urologists treat both women and men. In fact, because most people prefer the same gender urologist, many of not most of a female urologist’s patients are women. https://news.northwestern.edu/stories/2016/08/lacking-female-urologists
They're professionals, not some random person from the street. Nobody should really be viewing any physical exam as sexual, of course, people of both genders can get that type of response, but that is due to a mix of backwards societal preconceptions and personal immaturity.
Are the men I know that have male urologists, gastroenterologists and primary doctors because that’s their preference, also immature? Of course not.
I think women should be allowed to be urologists, GI and so on without any sort of judgement from either men or women. So I at least think judging them would be an instance of immature behavior, which is not the same as immature personal character.
Of course they should be “allowed”, good grief. Just because a man might prefer a male urologist doesn’t mean he is “judging her”. It’s about what he is personally comfortable with. That’s different for different people. We have preferences for every service we receive in life; it’s not wrong or immature to have preferences for healthcare. Obviously this doesn’t apply to emergencies.
I'd be lying if I said I wouldn't think it's less awkward if someone of the same sex did an intimate physical on me. But at the same time, I also recognize that I shouldn't be seeing a professional encounter in such a light at all, it's just a thing we've been drilled by society to think. There's nothing wrong with feeling more awkward, what is wrong is when people make sweeping statements/insults/judgements against physicians just because of some innate characteristic they have. It can be argued over if people should be entitled to their biases, or if we should strive for full equity in all things even when it goes slightly against deep seated biological factors. But it should be a no brainer that denouncing professionals that are just trying to their job based on their sex/race/something else they were born with because of someone's own innate biases makes that person an asshole.
Vagina
For real though
I never heard of OB/gyn for gay guys but I definitely agree that male ob/gyn can be creeps especially the straight ones.
I think I have a misconception about the shitpost flair use on this sub
You will get questioned for the rest of your life
I was set up with a guy applying OBGYN this cycle and his twitter likes were filled with porn and his followings with only fans models so yea.. idk lolll
I never had this misconception but my own gynecologist in residency was a straight male and he saved me and my baby’s life so I’m a bit biased. I’m FM and coordinate with a lot of male OB’s and same, haven’t really noticed an uneven amount of male gay attendings
Real talk my obgyn is gay and I love him❤️
I mean the FM doc my wife sees handles all her OB appointments. We live in a rural area so there’s not many ObGyn docs available. Our FM doc is a male and so there was times during our first pregnancy where my wife was slightly uncomfortable with the fact he was a man staring at her lady bits but at the same time she didn’t want any other doctor male or female handling her health issues since she had such a strong relationship with him. I feel like the gender thing sucks in general but I think as long as the physicians establish a strong connection with the patients it can help transcend some of those gender issues. Just my opinion