Reddit user NoSpot5547 asked the community, “What’s the most unprofessional thing a doctor has ever said to you?” Unfortunately, people had many stories to tell, ranging from unbelievable to horrific to disturbing.
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Their experiences inspired our BuzzFeed Community to share their own stories, proving that doctors don’t always treat people with the medical care they deserve.
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So, here are some of the most unprofessional things doctors have ever said to their patients:
Note: Some submissions include subjects of verbal abuse, sexual harassment, LGBTQ+ abuse, and suicide. Please proceed with caution.
1. “In middle school, I was seeing a psychiatrist for generalized anxiety and panic disorder. I had been struggling with my weight because I was too anxious to eat, and at one point, I was about 15 pounds underweight. I started taking antidepressants, and I gained weight once my anxiety started improving. One day, my psychiatrist brought me over to a scale so he could weigh me. He told me that I needed to watch what I was eating because I was ‘starting to get fat.’ I was finally at the low end of a healthy weight after struggling for months, and it was such a blow to my self-esteem after all the progress I had made. I broke out in tears as soon as he said that because it crushed me. My mom yelled at him, we walked out of his office, and never came back.”
—u/h_amphibius
2. “I was 19 years old and 21 weeks pregnant when I was told at my 20-week scan that my cervix was dilating, so I needed to take it easy, but the baby was perfectly fine and healthy. Not even a week after the scan, I was in the hospital bleeding and having contractions. They called it a ‘threatened miscarriage.’ The next day, the OB-GYN in charge came in to discuss the situation, and I asked him if there was any way to stop the contractions and keep my baby in until he was viable. What he said made my blood run cold: ‘Miscarriage is just nature’s quality control.’ I gave birth that afternoon, and my son survived for an hour before passing away. I complained and received a written apology from the doctor, and in my subsequent pregnancy, I refused him for my care.”
—u/yeahrightagain
3. “I’d constantly complain to my doctor that I couldn’t breathe when I would walk, and I would feel shortness of breath. I was always tired and fatigued, and I would get dizzy if I walked for too long. She always brushed it off and told me to get more sleep or drink more water, even though I was getting plenty of both. Finally, I made an appointment to talk to her face-to-face, and she flat-out just told me I was lazy and needed to exercise more. I was so embarrassed because I went with my husband, and she made me feel like I was just a lazy couch potato. I switched doctors, and my new doctor decided to do blood work, which is something the other doctor should have done in the first place, and found out I was severely anemic to the point of needing blood transfusions. I felt so much better after I got my infusions.”
—u/NotAsPlanned-
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NBC
4. “In 2021, I lost about 25-30 pounds by hardcore dieting and exercise. My husband lost about 40. Around this time last year, the weight started to come back on. I did attribute it to not being as strict with my diet or doing intense workouts. I should mention I have several health issues (lupus, fibromyalgia, celiac disease, and chron’s disease). So, a lot of times, I attributed weight gain to meds, but I also started to just feel awful every day. I had to drag myself out of bed every day. I saw all my ‘specialists’ so many times over the next six months and got the usual ‘sleep more and watch what you eat.’ I was begging for help because I just felt something wasn’t right. I’d gained water weight during bad flare-ups, but this weight wasn’t going away, and my symptoms weren’t either.”
“I saw my rheumatologists, and they said, ‘Yup, this is only lupus — you’ll have to adapt.’ I was so defeated.
Finally, at the start of summer, I had a phone appointment with my primary care physician. I had gained six pounds in four days, and I begged him for help. I now weigh more than when I lost weight in 2021.
I wasn’t heavy enough for injectable weight loss, but I was for oral diabetes meds. He finally said, ‘Hmmm, something doesn’t seem right.’ He ordered the meds and I had an ultrasound.
I started the meds, and within one month, I lost 16 pounds. Then I had the ultrasound. Due to my lupus, my kidneys were not processing my waste. Had I not fought to get help, I could have ended up in a much more severe situation.
I know it’s a pain and can be so defeating and heartbreaking, but don’t give up [finding a good doctor].”
—mamabearof2
5. “I was in the room when a doctor said to my husband, ‘I’m not going to figure out what it is. If it was serious, you’d be dead by now.’ We later found out that my husband’s uncle had seen this same doctor before he was diagnosed with colon cancer. By the time another doctor found it, it was too late, and he said there was no way it should have been missed.”
—u/Mellopiex
NBC
6. “When I was around seven years old, a doctor told my parents I had gotten used to all the attention after having an emergency appendectomy and was pretending to still be in excruciating pain. In reality, they’d left acid around, and it was literally burning tissue and creeping over to my liver, and then I spent a month in the hospital. A different doctor who used to be a family friend once told my six-year-old sister that Tourette syndrome wasn’t real and she needed to stop faking it. I can’t tell you how damaging that was and what it took to help her feel secure with her tics again.”
—u/in-site
7. “I suffered from lower abdominal pain for six years. My pain was dismissed — I was told it was anxiety, and it was ‘all in my head.’ I pushed for the doctors to take me to the ER multiple times. The pain became so bad I couldn’t stand straight and couldn’t wear restrictive clothes. I finally had a new doctor who ordered several painful and embarrassing tests that burned me inside. It showed diverticulosis. They knew from my first computed tomography scan that I had that condition but never thought to take a closer look. I had emergency surgery and colon resection. The surgeon laughed and told me if I had an ongoing infection for years, eating away at my cell walls, and that if I didn’t die, I would have been pooping out my vagina. They were laughing, mind you. I have read that 85% of white women are undiagnosed incorrectly or dismissed. What is the percentage for women of color? Are we talking 99.9%???”
—Anonymous
8. “In 2024, I went to see my primary doctor. I had been bouncing to different doctors to get answers about some symptoms I’d been having: bleeding from my rectum, weight gain (only in my midsection), and extreme tightness in my stomach (I worked remotely at the time and would take baths between meetings because it was the only way to get relief). I felt like my food wasn’t digesting — it would just sit, and then I’d burp it up all day. I was peeing a little bit 50 times a day, and I had gallbladder attacks that left me incapacitated for hours. This male doctor looked at my face and said, ‘Why do you think this is happening?’ I don’t know! THAT’S YOUR JOB, MY DUDE!”
“He fully examined my stomach and said that it was probably acid reflux and to take Prilosec OTC for a couple of weeks to see if that’d help. I said that I wasn’t having acid reflux as much as my stomach was just really tight. I kept saying that I thought it might be gallstones.
I wouldn’t leave his office until we got somewhere. He reluctantly said he COULD order an ultrasound, but it would cost $250. He said it like that would deter me. ‘Great!’ I said. ‘I’LL TAKE TWO!’
He did blood work and found the markers for pancreatitis, then wrote me a note saying not to eat any fatty foods. Whatever, fine. He also referred me for that ultrasound.
And a week later, I went for an ultrasound. That same doctor had to call me to tell me that they found a tumor bigger than a football in my abdomen. All the symptoms I was experiencing were textbook for an abdominal mass. And because the tumor was so big, it was literally crushing my other organs.
For two more weeks, I was rushed around to different doctors and specialists. It was removed (along with an ovary). It’s a super rare ovarian tumor that grew very fast.
I had never even had a cavity before. I had been in good health my whole life until I came in begging for help, and the man suggested it was anxiety and acid reflux…”
—Anonymous
HBO
9. “I went to a female OBGYN to get a birth control prescription and a checkup, and she found symptoms of trich. She said, with utter vitriol, ‘We need to get this cleared up because I know what you’re like, and if we don’t treat it ASAP, you’ll just spread it to dozens of innocent men.’ I was barely 19, and only had one sexual partner at the time. Before 19, I had never had sex before. This was my second OBGYN visit and I was lost and terrified. I’m 36 now, and I still remember that exchange (and probably will for life because what the fuck, ma’am?).”
—u/puffcake33
10. “I spent most of my life being told my migraines weren’t really migraines. They were just ‘stress or allergies.’ I was even told that if I lost weight, I wouldn’t have migraines. I’ve had them since I was seven years old, and I only went through a brief period of being ‘overweight’ after having my second child. But, one doctor felt the need to inform me that this was the reason I’d had migraines for 20 years! I finally found a doctor the year I turned 30 who treated me for the actual migraines rather than just brushing them off. Yep, 23 years to actually get treated for debilitating, nearly daily headaches. It’s been three years on the daily meds he put me on, and I only get headaches a few times a year now. Imagine that.”
—Anonymous
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11. “Someone I know went to an oncologist because she thought she might have cancer. The doctor said, ‘I have good news: Your test results are back, and you don’t have cancer. Congratulations.’ A week later, she gets a call to schedule her first round of chemotherapy. She says there must be some mistake because her doctor said she was cancer-free. The woman on the phone got really uncomfortable and said, ‘I have an order here from that doctor that you are to begin chemotherapy, so you better call his office to straighten this out. And perhaps contact a lawyer.’ She did, and it turned out that all of her charts showed she had cancer. The doctor knew it, but simply lied about it because he didn’t like to ‘deliver bad news.’ After investigating, they discovered several other patients who went through exactly the same ordeal.”
—u/squatch42
NBC
12. “I went to a dermatologist for hidradenitis suppurativa and wanted to discuss new skin issues related to the illness that had emerged on my breasts. I told her that my sweet husband didn’t give a hoot, but it was really bothering me. She said, ‘Well, there are treatment options, but the one person who really matters doesn’t care. So, I’d say let’s just leave it.’ I never went back — I also never paid the bill for that appointment. No regrets.”
—u/Opening-End-7346
13. “My gynecologist sent me a check. I’d been seeing him for maybe three years, so I had a few visits with him. There wasn’t any unprofessional behavior at all. But on the last visit, he was really out of character. He complimented my eyes and my ‘grooming.’ I paid with a check for $123 when leaving, as usual. But, a few days later, I received in the mail both the check I’d given at the office and a check for $250 with a smiley face in the notes section. I was very uncomfortable, and never went back to him.”
—u/Smashed_Cake
14. “At eight years old, I got my period. Obviously concerned about how young I was, my mom took me to the doctor. The doctor said to my mom, ‘Well, in some places, she’s now old enough to marry.’ Then they said to me, ‘Have a child now before you start chemo,’ which I was due to start a day or so later.”
—u/darkerthanmysoul
HBO
15. “I had a kidney stone, and I had a stent placed in because it was infected, so they couldn’t remove it right away. My appointment to remove it was eight weeks away. About halfway through, I was feeling really sick, like I had a UTI. The stent was infected, and I got antibiotics. I still felt quite sick a week later, so I went back. My bladder and back were just burning everywhere, and it hurt so much to pee. They said I was fine and there was nothing to do. I went to the drugstore and bought an over-the-counter UTI solution. It didn’t cure it all, but at least it improved it to be semi-bearable. I went and saw my doctor later because it still felt like I had a UTI, and it was minimal. But I was still on a maintenance antibiotic, so she didn’t want to give me more at the moment (and the urologist agreed).”
“I couldn’t handle it two days later, and when I went back, it was super busy. The nurse said I could go home, and I was like, ‘No — if I made an appointment with my doctor, she’d just send me back here.’
It turned out the stent was still infected, and I had a localized infection in my bowels. So, I got two doses of antibiotics. I had the stone and the stent removed a week later, and I was infected the whole length of my urinary tract and had to have a new stent put in. At least they were able to laser the stone.
Now, I have a bacterial infection in my bowels because of all the antibiotics I’ve taken. So, I have two more weeks of antibiotics for the low price of $358.”
—Anonymous
16. “My psychologist had advised me to go to the ER for help if I ever attempted suicide, so one day, I did. The doctor on call sent out his assistant to talk to me. She told me to go for a walk next time instead of wasting hospital resources. I told her, in return, that if I went for a walk in that state of mind, I would likely jump off the highway overpass. I get that exercise is good for your mental health, but come on. I still don’t know how that interaction SHOULD have gone, but that’s certainly not the kind of ‘help’ I was expecting.”
—u/orch4rd
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17. “The doctor said, ‘I’m happy to see you lost weight. I bet you’ll even be able to get a boyfriend now because it probably would have been hard for you before. Just make sure you keep it off…you want boys to be attracted to you, right?’ I was a 16-year-old girl with a boyfriend in the lobby. We had been together since before I lost weight (not that it mattered).”
—u/cosmiceggroll
ABC
18. “I had an emergency C-section with my first child. At the time, this required a four-day hospital stay. Every day, the hospital pediatrician came into the room and said, ‘You’re still here? Why don’t you go home?’ and other comments to indicate I was some kind of goldbricking person, rather than a patient after major surgery. I still don’t know what was wrong with this idiot. Was it his idea of a joke? Anyhoo, when the purge comes, he’s on my list.”
—u/[deleted]
19. “My doctor refused to do my first pelvic exam for a yeast infection because I told her I’d never been sexually active. She said I wouldn’t be ‘able to handle’ the speculum. I FINALLY convinced her, she took a look, and yelled that I lied to her. My hymen was torn, ergo, ‘I’d had sex.’ And that’s the story of how I told a medical professional that hymens can tear thanks to many non-sexual situations.”
—u/shiguywhy
20. “I fell with a bottle in my hand and cut through all the tendons and nerves from my pinky to the middle finger. The cut was about six centimeters long. I went to the doctor the next day, and after waiting for two hours in the lobby, I finally got in. He took three minutes to examine my hand before telling me to go home and rinse with water and an antiseptic. I remember feeling elated by his calm demeanor, and I thought the wound wasn’t too serious. I went home and did as he said. A couple of days later, I travelled back home to Switzerland (the plane trip was very painful). I took the bandage off when I got home and showed my mum. She went completely ballistic since the wound had gone septic, and my fingers were turning blue. I also had no movement or feeling in my pinky and its neighbor.”
“My mum rushed me to the ER immediately, where I received 23 stitches in my hand. The severed nerves had to be extended and tied together. The doctor told me I was extremely close to requiring an amputation of all three fingers.
I later complained to the hospital in Denmark about the doctor, but I probably should have sued. He failed to tell me the severity of my wound (cut tendons and nerves), so I think that qualifies as being extremely unprofessional. To this day, when I clench my fist, my pinky just points straight.”
—u/buis_kid21
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21. “My doctor told me, ‘It’s time for you to go back to your normal life and push through the pain. There’s nothing wrong with you.’ I broke down crying. He told me I was being overly emotional and stressing myself out over nothing. I actually have an extremely rare genetic mutation that affects the extracellular matrix of my cells, resulting in improperly formed/functioning connective tissue throughout my entire body. I had developed fibromyalgia to boot, enhancing all of that pain to a point where I struggled to walk.”
—u/Fair-Platform-9314
22. “I went to see a unit doc so I could get a referral to mental health to start transitioning. He thought the right answer to this was, ‘Are you sure you’re not gay? It’s okay to be gay in the army. You don’t need to ‘become a girl’ to sleep with men.’ I’m like, no, it’s okay, I’m attracted to girls. Cue his confused face.”
—u/TGitsSteph
23. “My IUD was displaced, resulting in a trip to the ER. The attending nurse asked who the guy was with me (who had left to scope out the vending machine for some snacks). I replied that he was my boyfriend of nearly six years. Her response was, ‘You’re 31, not married, and don’t have any kids? Who gave you an IUD?’ and rolled her eyes. This was at a well-respected hospital in PA. The nurse was younger than I was…”
—u/tashalovescake
Working Title Films
24. “When my wife was pregnant, we decided not to circumcise our son. When telling our doctor, she tried to change our minds. Not by telling us anything medical or health-wise, but because her boyfriend said guys made fun of uncut guys ‘in the locker room.'”
—u/DMTrious
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25. “My dad was mistreated by his military doctor. He went in, was diagnosed with an infection, and was prescribed antibiotics by a nice doctor. He went back for a follow-up and ended up with a mean doctor, who basically said he was going to cancel his prescription. My dad wasn’t done with them — they were just checking if they were working. The mean doctor said he ‘needed to toughen up and stop being a wimp.’ My dad basically requested they stop speaking, citing the doctor’s rank as a reason why. The doctor got angry, saying, ‘Are you threatening me? Undermining my authority?’ My dad responded, ‘Quite the opposite.’ He did get to see the nice doctor again, and his prescription remained the same. He eventually recovered.”
—u/ShortNerdyOne
26. “I was newly sober and had to have most of my teeth pulled. The dental surgeon poked around at my healed track marks, then brought all his staff in to look at them. He accused me of ‘taking cocaine and xanax’ the night before and threatened not to put me under because of that. It was humiliating on a level I cannot explain. I was already humiliated and embarrassed at the shape of my mouth, and all I could do was politely sit there and take it, wait for him to finish, and do his job. What an asshole.”
—u/notsleptyet
NBC
27. “I went to see my doctor about a pain I’d been feeling in my lower left abdomen for a couple of days. He asked me a few questions, waved his hand, and said, ‘It’s just a pulled muscle, don’t worry about it. But, I am going to talk to you about that tattoo on your arm.’ He proceeded to lecture me about the risks of tattoos and how unclean tattoo parlors are because they use the same needles over and over, the ink is synthetic, and I have plastic in my skin. He gave me all of this outdated information they used to scare people with in the ’80s and ’90s. I was 31 and he was talking down to me like I was a kid.”
“Years went by, and it turned out the pain was diverticulitis, and it eventually ended up almost killing me. I’d recently had issues with my stomach and was under a gastroenterologist’s care.
When he asked about my past intestinal problems, I told him what the old doctor told me. The new doctor shook his head and said: ‘Pain in that area means two things: diverticulitis or cancer. You’re very lucky it was diverticulitis.'”
—u/FourColorOffset
28. “When I went to my gyno a few years ago after the check-up, he asked me, ‘What’s your husband’s name?’ I said I didn’t have a husband. Then he asked for my boyfriend’s name, and I said I didn’t have one. ‘Wow, you just go through a lot of batteries, then?’ the doctor said. I’ve had doctors say really horrible things to me, and I would say this is one of the most shocking.”
—u/plainbagel11
Disney+
29. “I thought I had strep throat. I felt horrible, and could see white patches on the back of my throat. I went to my doctor’s and had to see the PA. He accused me of ‘pill shopping’ and said to come back in a week. Yeah, ‘pill shopping’ for antibiotics. I came back a week later with lymph nodes the size of golf balls and definitely had strep throat for the past week. I refused to pay the bill from the PA visit and filed a complaint.”
—u/lil_adk_bird
30. And finally, “When I was 22, I noticed pain in my side and nausea. I lost my appetite, and I was pretty tired all the time. I went to my doctor and told him all my symptoms and concerns, and he said I needed to get better sleep and was probably constipated. Then he sent me home. This went on for a month, and I got so bad that I lost 18 lbs because I couldn’t eat. I kept passing out, I had intense pain in my side, and I ended up passing out on my children one night. They couldn’t wake me up. They ran and got their dad, who carried my unconscious body to the truck and then to the ER. I was severely dehydrated and unconscious, and they apparently did some imaging on me and found that my kidney was double in size, and I was dying.”
“They pumped me full of meds and kept me until they watched it unswell. Eventually, I was sent home after being in the hospital for three days.
The first thing the doctor said to me was, ‘Why didn’t you come in sooner — you would’ve been dead in another week?!’ I not-so-politely reminded him that I did, in fact, come in about my issues, and he dismissed me for being constipated.
He said I didn’t make him aware of just how much pain I was in — I couldn’t believe him.”
—u/Odd-potato3000
Island Records
Note: Some submissions have been edited for length and/or clarity.
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