Chaperones and intimate physical examinations: what do male and female patients want?

INTRODUCTION: Many studies of patients' perception of a medical chaperone have focused on female patients; that of male patients are less well studied. Moreover, previous studies were largely based on patient populations in English-speaking countries. Therefore, this study was conducted to investigate the perception and attitude of male and female Chinese patients to the presence of a chaperone during an intimate physical examination. METHODS: A cross-sectional guided questionnaire survey was conducted on a convenient sample of 150 patients at a public teaching hospital in Hong Kong. RESULTS: Over 90% of the participants considered the presence of a chaperone appropriate during intimate physical examination, and 84% felt that doctors, irrespective of gender, should always request the presence of a chaperone. The most commonly cited reasons included the availability of an objective account should any legal issue arise, protection against sexual harassment, and to provide psychological support. This contrasted with the experience of those who had previously undergone an intimate physical examination of whom only 72.6% of women and 35.7% of men had reportedly been chaperoned. Among female participants, 75.0% preferred to be chaperoned during an intimate physical examination by a male doctor, and 28.6% would still prefer to be chaperoned when being examined by a female doctor. Among male participants, over 50% indicated no specific preference but a substantial minority reported a preference for chaperoned examination (21.2% for male doctor and 25.8% for female doctor). CONCLUSIONS: Patients in Hong Kong have a high degree of acceptance and expectations about the role of a medical chaperone. Both female and male patients prefer such practice regardless of physician gender. Doctors are strongly encouraged to discuss the issue openly with their patients before they conduct any intimate physical examination.

[Clinical study on effect of combined treatment of fuchunpian with radiotherapy on nasopharyngeal carcinoma].

The study based on the clinical prospective trial of 60 cases of nasopharyngeal carcinoma treated with combined treatment of radiotherapy and Fuchunpian in our hospital from September, 1988 to January, 1990. Results of clinical data of 5 years follow-up showed that Fuchunpian not only couldn't enhance the radiosensitivity of patients, but also increase the blood metastatic potency, the metastatic rate of patients treated with Fuchunpian (36.7%) was 2.67 times higher than that without it (10.0%). Therefore, it was considered that use Fuchunpian as a routine either administrated alone or combined with radiotherapy in treatment of nasopharyngeal carcinoma is not suitable.