inappropriate tickling at hospital?

[Ticklerguy4u]

im seeing a lot of negative responses to her age. I wonder how many of us would feel insulted when we reach that age. I am wondering if we would want to hear??

"I don't want you to tickle me..you are too old!!" or "I don't tickle old people like you." ...oh well I guess when you reach a certain age..All of you will give it up. Something to look forward too I guess...

 

[One&OnlyShadow]

I don't really see that it was that inappropriate. I mean most people dont think about tickling in the same way as we do. I think it was good to make the patient feel good. I don't know though this is just my opinion. My school is a very big medical school and there are a lot of nursing majors up there. I will have to run this senerio by them and see what they have to say.

Shadow

 

[aun_existe_amor]

What most of you don't seem to understand is that not everyone gets something good out of being tickled, not only that but, WHERE IS YOUR RESPECT FOR YOUR ELDERS???

 

[kis123]

WHERE IS YOUR RESPECT FOR YOUR ELDERS???

Good question-I saw it go out of the window about 1980 or so.....

As I said before, I don't really see intentional harm or anything lewd being done. I also mentioned that there might have been a friendly physical relationship between them that the family member wasn't familiar with. But I say the family member has a right to question it without backlash.

As much as I enjoy tickling, I never have been fond of watching spontaneous unnegotiated tickling. I hated to be tickled as a kid because it was used as a way to control me. I only enjoy it if I invite the ler or know that the tickling between others was consentual and pre-negotiated. I know that sounds wierd, but non-consentual tickling AT ANY LEVEL, regardless of whom is hard for me to see. For some odd reason, it makes me feel offended and violated. I feel really strange now so I'm retreating back to my corner of the universe..........

We now live in a society where teachers cannot hug their small students and where touching can be considered inappropriate. It is unfortunate that a small percentage of people took their jobs and positions of autority and used them to abuse and violate others. The masses have to suffer for the actions of a few-society's always been that way. They'd rather throw a broad brush over the thing instead of looking at issues on a case-by-case basis. It sucks, but why risk the job you spent years and dollars on over it?

 

[tickleking]

Since an opinion was asked for I'll add my two cents to what Ann said:

Those of us with a particular interest in tickling see it differently than those without. I'm sure we've all been in situations where we saw someone get a quick tickle and its burned into our mind while the other people don't even remember it.

While, from what was written, it sounds really bad, it may have been bigger in your mind than it really was. Reality is a tought thing to get a hold of sometimes, especially when are view is skewed by personal preference.

~ toyou

Amen! It is tickling, after all, and persons on this board see it differently than others ITRW...

Regards,

TK

 

[steph]

Ya, my patients cry opening up to me on a regular basis, I even carry Kleenex w/me~co-workers call me Barbara Walters! "What the hell did you say to them?" Shocked me: "nothing, he started talking and just melted down!"
I will frequently tweak a toe (not to tickle) or touch a hand on my way out the door. So far, no one seems to mind...
XOXO

Today i put my hand on a patient's shoulder as a simple gesture of compassion as she was in tears over the news that i was unfortunately the bearer of.

I hope her husband didn't think i was gratifying my shoulder fetish.

Btw, Meth....that is the single funniest reply i have seen in years!

 

[nenezinho]

Many wrong and exagerated atitudes here!

Makes me think what kind of world are we creating for our children!

The guy did something not usual and stopped as soon as the patient asked. Conclusion: He was trying to be playfull period! He stoped when he realized it was not a good thing to that patient! He had good judgement by himself and probably wont forget it next time.

Many people here seem to know that some people hate to be tickled. This is true! It´s true that to some people tickling is bad! But one thing you need to remember is that tickling is an ordinary human behaviour and most of the humans have nothing against it!! Actually, the maiority of those who don´t like it are people who either had problems with it during childhood or people who can´t stand to be overpowered by others (thus having attitude problems which is quite comon in todays competitive society).

BUT.....

AND IF....

If something really didn´t seem alright to you, then you should politely tell it to the implied person first.Then you see how he/she reacts. And only after you think if he/she deserves to loose their job.

I´d like to see how many of those more agressive fellows would react if someone quickly asked for them to be fired after they did something out of the usual on their jobs.
Doctors or nurses or what else, we´re speaking about real people, and we need to think a bit before firing everyone right and left.

 

[aun_existe_amor]

Just because you report something or question something it does not mean that the doctor or nurse will get fired. They can't be fired for no reason, well, not in England anyway.

Someone please explain to me how it is acceptable for a trained member of staff in a hospital to tickle a person's foot when they have just had knee replacement surgery, are elderly, have dementia, and the leg is trapped in an exercise machine? Is it not reasonable to expect that when you tickle a foot it makes the person jump or try to pull their leg away? How can this be playful or relaxing to not only an ELDERLY WOMAN WITH DEMENTIA, but also she just had KNEE REPLACEMENT SURGERY!!!

 

[KoocheeKoo]

I certainly hope no one believes I overreacted by becoming angry two years ago when a home health nurse deliberately tickled my great aunt to tears.....until I angrily demanded the nurse STOP upsetting my great aunt (who was 89 yrs old and just out of the hospital; suffering from inoperable cancer and kidney disease....which ended her life less than a year later 🙁

I've witnessed innocent and/ or accidental tickling in medical settings; what was perpetrated that day in my home against my great aunt was malicious; willful and mean spirited....the HH nurse's way of "getting even" with a confused and sometimes difficult Alzheimers victim. She became frustrated because my great aunt didn't want her feet examined for diabetes (which was honestly a mute point since she was already DYING from kidney failure at this point)......and tickled the daylights out of my great aunt's left foot; my poor little aunt screaming for her to stop.....totally panicked to the point of cursing (something aunt Millie rarely did) and crying uncontrollaby. I told the b#tch to stop upsetting my great aunt and GET THE HELL out of my home (and I'm normally very kindhearted and laid back; it infuriated me to see her so upset my great aunt; knew from experience getting so upset could trigger another "TIA" (light stroke); aunt Millie was already partially paralyzed in her right arm....hand and arm completely numb from the elbow down. The reason it ticked me off had nothing to do with tickling....it was the fact what occurred got my great aunt so upset.

Just for the record: I DIDN'T ask or demand the home health nurse be fired; I told her supervisor to NEVER send her to my home again; that her actions were out of line and unprofessional. I have medical training; have cared for my elderly (93 yrs old) grandmother for ten years....cared for my great aunt from age 87 until her death last July; I know what is innocent/ accidental tickling and what is wrong. I also asked several of my best friends who are nurses (as are several of my brother in law's loved ones), and all of them agreed the home health nurse's behavior in my home was both wrong and very unprofessional.

 

[Sunjob]

You can type that again!

At the rate we're going all human contact will be illegal within the workplace soon enough.

what was perpetrated that day in my home against my great aunt was malicious

Yeah, exactly. That's the differance here, he's given a quick tickle in a playful way and stopped as soon as he found out it made her uncomfortable. If there WERE malice there then I would completley agree with the idea that he should be reported, 101%.

Someone please explain to me how it is acceptable for a trained member of staff in a hospital to tickle a person's foot when they have just had knee replacement surgery, are elderly, have dementia, and the leg is trapped in an exercise machine? Is it not reasonable to expect that when you tickle a foot it makes the person jump or try to pull their leg away? How can this be playful or relaxing to not only an ELDERLY WOMAN WITH DEMENTIA, but also she just had KNEE REPLACEMENT SURGERY!!!

Yeah but if you read the first post he TOLD her they were tickling her (which removes the suprise, hence an unlikely knee jerk) and also only tickled her foot briefly for a few seconds. What might seem like just a simple scratch or light touch might seem like way more to somebody who has an interest in tickling like all (or at least most) of the people in this thread. The majority of the tickling was on her ribs and I'd assume even that was to a light degree.

The first time I read it I thought "wow that seems really wrong" but I read it again and realised that it wasn't as bad as I first thought. Maybe we're just seeing it completley different and you imagine something a lot different to what I imagine and in all honesty you might be right because we only have what we've read, neither of us were there so neither of us can be completley sure.

In my personal opinion though it doesn't seem like there was much violation, malice or general mis-treatment. I completley agree that if the poster thinks it did involve any violation, malice or mis-treatment then they should totally report or something, but they have to be completley sure because putting a doctor, nurse or therapist under scrutiny for mis-treating a patient can lead to some serious repacussions.

 

[Italian_Touch]

Do some of you people ever get out?? WOW.... The ones who are calling for the guys job need to get your head checked........ He gave her a little tickle in a non sexual way to cheer her up, and when she said stop he did immediatly. Chill the hell out, here.

mmhhh... she was not there to have fun, but to get a treatment.
The relationship between a care-provider and a patient is not paritetic in nature and gives the care-provider many delicate right, included the access to someone else body for professional purposes.
Now, I am not aware of any proved benefit in building a better patient-doctor (or nurse) relationship through tickling. I don't judge from a one-sided report but the behavior does sound 100% unprofessional. I don't know if it is a call for the job, maybe not, but, sorry, I find it really inappropriate or at least a bad option among the tools that were available to manage the situation.

 

[tklcouple]

Apples and Oranges

Koochekoo's situation with his great aunt was totally different in my opinion. This was, from the desription, a malicious attack to make the patient uncomfortable and her wishes to stop were not respected. This is in direct contrast to the first scenario when the patient's wish was respected. This is in comparison to if someone accidentally bumps into you in a crowd and genuinely apologizes as opposed to some guy (or woman) deliberately checking you into the wall (the hocky fans here will know this sight well!) perhaps repeatedly. Yeah, both bumped but one is a human error and another is an outright assault.

To respond to AEA: American medicine and medicine culture is different than in England. We are overrun with attorneys running amok looking to drum up money filing lawsuits for any reason at all. Because of this much of the reason and common sense is gone from our court system (e.g. when you can break into someone's home to rob them, hurt yourself while doing so, get caught by the police and sue the homeowner for your inury and win the cost of the home itself, this is sad). In the institution's attempt to avoid such a rediculous legal situation, that therapist if reported may not only be fired but become unemployable because their record will read "accused of assaulting a patient", which is in reality far from what happened. One subjective moment of discomfort due to a fetsih tainted perspective could result in ruining someone's life's work and employability. This is very sad but true. When it comes to health care and law, you Brits have a very different sysytem than we do.

Just my $0.02

Professor Tkl

 

[aun_existe_amor]

In my opinion it was assault and I don't think that has anything to do with a "fetish tainted perspective". Maybe the therapist shouldn't lose their job for what they did but they should certainly be warned that tickling a patients foot when they have just had surgery is not a very good idea and can cause distress to the patient and pain.

From what I have read and from my own experiences with American hospitals it seems that you are quite correct in saying that they are different from British hospitals. It seems that our cultures are very different in many ways. Maybe it's going from one extreme to another there, I don't know, it seems to me that Americans did sue everyone for the slightest thing but now because of that there are so many contracts and things to sign that it makes it difficult to report anything or be rightly compensated for anything. People/companies seem to get away with much more than they should.

If this therapist thinks it's ok to tickle someone's foot when they have just had leg surgery, which he obviously does or he wouldn't have done it infront of relatives, then he must have done it before and will do it again. It has nothing to do with fetishes. If he had a tickling fetish he probably wouldn't be tickling patients especially not infront of other people. I'm not seeing this from a lers point of view, I'm seeing it from a nurses point of view. It's the same as me tickling someone in the last stage of terminal cancer and when the patient says "no, stop" I stop. Does that make it ok that I put a patient in distress even for a couple of seconds just because I stopped when they asked me to? NO!!! It does not make it ok and never will!!! I could argue that I tickled the patient slightly and playfully to put a smile on their face and help them forget their pain for a few seconds but I would be completely wrong. All I would acheive would be the patient feeling uneasy and violated.

 

[scissorman]

why should anyone have to "Respect thier elders" .. unless I have a personal reason to give you my respect, you aren't getting it.

You want respect because your older than me, and have worked your whole life? Big deal. I've worked for the last 5 years and will continue to do so for the rest of my life. I don't demand respect for it. It's what everyone does.


Respect doesn't come easy

 

[TickledToDeath]

All your opinion........... which I disagree with 110 percent.

I can see it now....

"Hey, one of your workers gave my grandma a quick foot tickle to cheer her up and when she said she didn't want to be tickled anymore he quit immediatly... but damnit, I want his ass FIRED!"

How dumb is that??

Well armpit, dumb? Not. I worked in a hospital and in an ER as well and if that happend and the patient made a single complaint about it, the employee would be dismissed without question or hesitation. Suspended for a significant period of time at the very least and that is policy for practically any every hospital in the US.
Regardless of how "harmless" anyone would think it is or was, it is and or can be construed as "assault" and that is a FACT.
It would not be up to the complaintant whether or not the person is fired but if the patient(or coworker for that matter) made the complaint and demand, it would be done in an instant.

 

[WorkInProgress]

Okay...my turn. Let me suggest a couple of things.

First of all, I don't think the motives of the guy at the hospital were either sexual or malicious. I actually see it in a whole other category, which is, the tendency of many hospital and nursing home staff to treat elderly people like children. This includes having pet nicknames for them (like calling an elderly man named Edward "Mister Ed," as in, a horse on an old-time TV show), and in this instance it included tickling. For me the question was, would he have done that with a 40-year-old woman with an injured leg? That's where I say no, probably not. The thing to remember is, the average adult in that context would find tickling annoying and unpleasant and somewhat of a violation of boundaries, and since my philosophy is that you should treat an 80-something or 90-something person the same way as you would treat a 40-something or 50-something person, it's on those grounds that it seems inappropriate. The issue for me is that he got playful with her the same way one would get playful with a 5-year-old child (who would probably enjoy it if it's brief).

Now, coming to the question of whether it's so inappropriate that it warrants complaining to management, I'll defer to your judgment rather than offering my own, since you were there and I wasn't. But I do hope I've effectively offered another context for you to consider, in terms of assessing just what the deed in question really was.

 

[kis123]

Not to take this off topic, but........

why should anyone have to "Respect thier elders" .. unless I have a personal reason to give you my respect, you aren't getting it.

You want respect because your older than me, and have worked your whole life? Big deal. I've worked for the last 5 years and will continue to do so for the rest of my life. I don't demand respect for it. It's what everyone does.


Respect doesn't come easy

Do you have children? If not, remember your post when you do.

My generation gave elders respect as people who earned it through life experiences and hard work. I was not to backtalk or sass my elders and it didn't matter whether they "deserved' my respect or not! I was the child and I'll have mine when it became my turn-until then I just sucked it up. I'm raising my children the exact same-respect their elders or deal with me! They'll both tell you that it's a lot easier to just show the respect.

I'll have NOTHING to do with anyone who is not respectful towards me. I could care less who likes me-I very much care if they respect me. When I become old someday, I would like to delude myself into believing I'll get respected. But I really don't see much of that happening then or now.

Now returning this thread back to topic................

 

[aun_existe_amor]

why should anyone have to "Respect thier elders" .. unless I have a personal reason to give you my respect, you aren't getting it.

You want respect because your older than me, and have worked your whole life? Big deal. I've worked for the last 5 years and will continue to do so for the rest of my life. I don't demand respect for it. It's what everyone does.


Respect doesn't come easy

Actually respect does come easy! If you treat others with respect, even complete strangers, you are more likely to be treated respectfully by others. I treat everyone with respect no matter what their age until they treat me poorly a few times, then I just give up and treat them the same way they treat me. Everyone deserves a second chance in my opinion but I usually give a few chances and still show respect. Some people weren't brought up in a way that they understand respect because they were never shown respect by their parents so they have no idea how to show respect and think that if they aren't respected then why should they respect others. It's not their fault. I like to make people feel good about themselves and showing respect to everyone, even strangers, usually does that. In return I am shown respect 🙂

 

[luv2tcklprklyua]

I have to say up front, that the first time I read this original post I was appauled and infuriated so much with what I was reading, I just had to walk away from responding to it until I got myself under control. This is supposed to be a "flame-free" environment and I did not want to strike my torch, out of respect for "the rules", fellow members, and the forum!

While I would have to agree that there are elements of this original post of which I am NOT aware, and must then base my opinion only upon those elements of the story that I can see (the words written and information given by the original poster), if this story is all that it "appears" to be, I would consider this incident to be EXTREMELY unprofessional and inappropriate for the environment and atmoshere in which it occured. I am challenged to believe that ANY forethought was given to the results of these therapist's actions, instead, they simply acted spontaneously to satisfy their own selfish whims with total disregard for this elderly womans current condition and overall well-being!!! It appears to have happened simply beacause they thought they could get away with it...period! These therapist's told the elderly woman what THEY were going to do (and I quote, "We're tickling your toes", then proceed to do so)....excuse me?...but what part of this incident includes the elderly woman's input in that decision? I must have missed that part (likely because IT IS'NT THERE!). And as I read the story, the "NO, NO, NO" from the elderly woman came BEFORE the therapist then moved on to probing her sides (contrary to many claims here that the therapist's stopped at the elderly womans request)...EXCUSE ME?...The elderly woman in this story was NOT in compliance with what was being done to her; the incident was AGAINST her will as the article further supports. I have always understood that doing something to someone without their consent and against their will was defined as taking advantage of them; more simply put,...abuse!!! However mild, innocent, and insignifcant this incident might appear to some, realize that cases of more major abuse started from a small seed (...like this one), growing bigger and bigger as more and more is gotten away with. One has to consider the potential of where something like this could lead (the implications of the bigger picture) in something such as this.

Aun Existe Amor? (...lovely name BTW)...I have read your comments throughtout this entire thread, along with all of the others too, and must say that you have my STRONG support on this one! It's refreshing to see that words such as "DISCRETION" and "INTEGRITY" still hold high value amoung some others!!!
You're right on target, babe!

And lastly, I honestly was'nt quite sure where the original poster stood on this based on their closing remarks. Initially thinking this incident to be inappropriate having posted it in the first place, then apparently shifting their perspective to one of finding it to be somewhat flattering should it have happened to them...???? Just for free,...be careful!; straddling fences like that can really rack you up!