I doubt if this is true. At least not in my circle of male friends. I am a 66 yr.old male, and I really don’t care what gender is at the end of the finger.

It really depends more on how comfortable the patient is with the doctor. Most women will not let male doctors do PAP smears on them. Likewise, most men will not let female doctors do PSA. But does this make patients “sexists”? I don’t think so.

But living and practicing in the deep south where race is always a prominent issue in social relationships has given the opportunity to observe that race is only a factor when nothing else is known–even for people with frankly racist attitudes. I don’t think therefore that it is likely to ever be a factor in people leaving your practice once they have seen you–from that point you are on you own with them.

Starting to wonder whether people treated you in a certain way because of race, even when it is true, is a crippling mental habit to let oneself get into. On the one hand it leads to a certain paranoid defensiveness that creates interpersonal problems of it’s own, while giving one a universal defense to deal with rejection that prevents self-assessment and improvement.

People do unconsciously feel more comfortable with those like themselves–from their own tribe. That isn’t psychopathological–it is just natural. Our culture rightly condemns it and puts pressure on us to suppress it and overcome it, but people regress when sick and we as physicians have to objectify that, not take it personally, and try to work through it, over it, or around it keeping patient care paramount. We have the advantage that medicine is seen as an international brotherhood above nationality, sect, and race. Lets work to keep it that way.

We notified the doctor who did some tests and sure enough, I had acites building up in me. I can now see where it would be beneficial to have a multi-cultural staff on hand.

While I was a patient, the woman in the next bed’s surgeon was from India. Although this doctor spoke perfect English, she would tell her family she couldn’t understand a word he said. She constantly complained about this doctor who saved her life.

I would then, through the curtain, let them know what was said. Of course, she asked to be moved once she saw I wasn’t 100% anglo-saxon. (Or maybe she didn’t want to know what was wrong with her). Which was great for me, because then I had a room to myself.

Was there a breakdown by perceived race in the study?