Let me start by saying that as someone with a lifelong concern, preoccupation, okay, outsized and runaway paranoia about health issues, I have always respected, admired, okay, downright revered all medical professionals. Covid wreaked merciless havoc on every level of our health care system and left its ranks severely depleted, but, folks, I say this from the bottom of my reverent medical junkie heart—and spleen, too—we have to stop recruiting people who flunked out of Hamburger U to fill the vacancies.
After years of receiving excellent medical care at every level, I’ve recently had experiences with providers that have left me confused, wary, okay, kind of horrified. Due to a change in insurance, I had to part ways with my beloved providers and start over with a slew of new practices. My first nutty experience started after I scheduled a new bone density test to monitor my seesawing osteopenia/osteoporosis.
A few days before the test, I received a call from the imaging center to confirm my mammogram appointment. (I wasn’t due for a mammogram and hadn’t scheduled one, but hypochondriac that I am, my mind momentarily worried that “they” knew something I didn’t and were calling to suggest I get a mammogram, and pronto.)
“I haven’t scheduled a mammogram,” I nervously told the young woman on the phone. “Did my doctor just order this?”
“Well, I don’t know, but you are down for a mammogram Monday at 2, so be here at 1:45.”
“Does your department do the scheduling for both mammograms and bone density tests?” I asked.
“Yes, she responded.
“Aha, there’s the mistake. I do have a bone density test, not a mammogram, scheduled for Monday at 2.”
“Whatever,” she said, clearly unfazed by my detective work, and proceeded to robotically recite the familiar litany of mammogram instructions about no powders, lotions, or deodorants, which seemed very odd to me for a bone density test. Well, I thought, trying to give her the benefit of the doubt, maybe the technology has changed since my last test, necessitating these strange instructions.
At 1:45 Monday, I signed in at the imaging center for my bone density test, sans powder, lotion, or deodorant, just to be on the safe side. About twenty minutes later, a woman called me and two other women back to the inner sanctum, handed us each a soft pink robe from the warming station, and directed us to undress from the waist up in the changing cubicles. I was thoroughly confused. Even if this was a new procedure for bone density tests, for which I’d always remained fully clothed, why would I only undress from the waist up, I wondered. What about the bottom half of my spine and my hips; were those bones magically visible through clothing while the rest of me was not?
“Excuse me,” I called after our tour guide, “my name is Lee Gaitan and I think there’s a mistake—”
“No, I have your name checked off, no worries, dear,” her voice trailed off as she and her clipboard quickly disappeared around the corner.
I didn’t know what else to do but take off my shirt and bra and join my robe-clad sisters in the waiting area.
Every ten or so minutes, someone would appear from behind one of the closed doors and call a woman in. Five women came and went while I still sat there clueless. Finally, a different clipboard woman came and asked me my name and what I was waiting for. When I told her I was there for a bone density test, she flipped. “Then what are you doing back here? You shouldn’t be here! Get dressed and go back out in the main waiting room until someone calls you to the other door,” she scolded me sternly.
“I only came in because—” I tried to explain, but she was gone.
I did as she instructed and went back out to wait. Another twenty minutes passed before I was called into yet another room, presumably the right one for a bone density test. Once there, the technologist, a dour older man (as in even older than my 65 years and considerably less animated) wordlessly positioned me on the table. He then shuffled over to sit behind the “controls.”
“Confirm your name and DOB and hike up your bra above your ribs. The underwire is in the way,” he instructed flatly.
I stated my name and DOB and then, trying to be accommodating, volunteered to remove my bra via the out-the-sleeve maneuver if that would be better.
Suddenly, Mr. Semicomatose snapped to attention, jumping up and bellowing, “Nooo! Keep your clothes on! No clothes come off in this room! All. Clothes. Stay. On.”
I was so startled I almost fell off the table. There must have been a hella back story to this outburst, but I wasn’t about to ask. I yanked the bottom of my bra up toward my neck and held still as my bones were being photographed through my clothes, which, to be clear, fully covered my body at all times.
The nutball continued to mutter “Clothes stay on” under his breath every time he repositioned me for another film. Finally, the test was finished and he dismissed me with a curt, “Your doctor will get the results.”
I couldn’t get off the table and out the door fast enough. I bolted through the waiting room and out of the facility’s front door to the parking lot, my bra still up around my neck. Once home, I sat down and calmed my nerves with a “cold one”—a can of Coke Zero, which I’ve all but given up, but I felt entitled to cheat a little after the experience I’d had.
Shaking my head over the day’s events, I wondered what adventure awaited me in a few months when it really was time for my next mammogram. I can now tell you it didn’t disappoint. Stay tuned, my friends. And in the meantime, keep your dang clothes on!