Female Steth Exams Bra on or off?

I have been asked to take my bra off several times. Once or twice I have not bothered to wear a bra that day medical or not.

When listening to the mitral or tricuspid areas, the proper exam requires the bra to come off or if the woman is large breasted, the breast needs to be lifted by patient or doc.

I think it all depends on the doctors. Some may ask the patient to take it off.

My wife usually doesn't wear a bra to the doctors if she's there for a non-gyno visit, she'll wear something like a tank top with a built in bra or something. In these cases the doctor can usually just put the stethoscope down her top.

My wife tells me that she is always nude from the waist up when the doctor checks her lungs and heart. He will go right into her breast exam.

If i am having a check up then my bra is alreeady off and I am in a gown. If i go to see the family GP because o cough etc then just remove top and she listens around bra first of all then just asks to lift it up abit when listening lower down and it gets in the way. Alwyas been that way for last few years since we all started seeing her

In the "real world", steth exams do not require removing the bra. If a breast exam is being done (or some other related procedure that requires removing the bra), auscultation could be done at that time.

In a GP's routine pulmonary and heart auscultation it's common the doctor not ask to remove the bra. Most of pulmonary areas are accessible and concerning heart only mitral and in some cases tricuspid may be not easily reachable depending also on size of the breasts. Doctor's solution for this may be "inserting the diaphragm" inside the bra and listening bellow the breast.

If a female patient goes to a cardiologist or if ant heart condition such as any murmur is suspected I do believe the auscultation will be done with bra off. Methodical precordium and heart examination will include palpation of the appex and heart and auscultation at the 4/5 classic areas : aortic, pulmonic, second pulmonic, tricuspide and mitral both with diaphragm and the bell of the stethoscope. Listening will be done in additional areas too and the listening heart positions of the patient will be at least 3 not to talking of special manoeuvres.

Concerning pulmonary auscultation I do believe the bra will go off if the doctor will suspect of consolidation of right middle lobe ( a common site for consolidation - pneumonia ). Even if sounds of right middle lobe can be heard by irradiation at right axilae the evaluation will include percussion and auscultation at the exact location of this part of the lung. Considering it's anatomical location it may be needed to ask female patients to lie down which will allow their breasts to fall away laterally, which may make this part of the examination easier.In some cases the doctor or the patient will have to lift or move the breast for a more complete evaluation

Well, in order to have at least a little bit of "fun" in the doctor's office I prefer to have my bra removed....after the exam I go home and masturbate...

Normally docs steth me with my bra on, my gyn never steth me, but the cardiologist asked me to take it off or simply pull it down , she steth me & I also had an EKG.

Probably depends on the size of the bra. like a sports bra would probably be requested to be removed? I had a friend in high school who was taken into detention center after running away from home. I visited with a friend while she was there and overheard her talking to her female friend (not me) but i overheard. she described the doctor looking her over when she was admitted. He asked her to undress to her underwear. He looked at her from behind and I think was looking for abuse signs. he then said, let me see you from the front, move your hands at your sides. ( I guess she had them crossed infront of her. then I heard her say: and so I was just standing there half naked with my hands at my sides and looked me up and down. then he told me to get dressed. I got such a hard on listening to that conversation.

Know why the trend is toward not removing clothing during patient encounters - simple money money money you have to keep the patient flow (sounds like we're talking bath tub) but the average total time a family practice spends with a patient is 8.7 minutes. That college loan won't get paid off with the 45 minute exams we were taught. Its auscultation and maybe a feel of the belly - just maybe. I observed one guy (high yielder making making $273,000 quarterly (saw profit/loss statement). This was his auscultatory procedure "Lift up your chin" Placed steth on left carotid - then right carotid - Do you need anything (Viagra, Cialis what eve) And then he was gone! Patients love him! DrLaennec 145 out of 146 Striving still to truths unknown.

I am always topless; both for real exams and play exams.

Topless is better for doing a better exam.

Amen DrLaennec production line medicine has become the rule and looking to get worse long before it gets better, if it ever does!

I think its good to initially listen to the upper chest and back with the top off but bra on. Then ask the patient to remove her bra so you can check her heartbeat. Gently lifting her left breast and placing the steth just below it is an exciting moment in the exam.

My ob-gyn always has me in a top paper vest thing and a paper sheet on the bottom. She opens the vest to listen to my heart and is very thorough. My other doctors just slip the stethoscope under my shirt and work around my bra. My ob-gyn puts the stethoscope in several different places including under my breast, so it seems like she ges a more thorough cardio exam without it.

From what I can read in most forums, it seems unnecessary to have the bra removed for auscultation. Maybe it makes the doctors job easier to hear without having to work around a bra?

The vast majority of doctors I have seen require bra off and gown lowered, and usually I am stethed both while sitting up and laying down.

I remember my wife during a check up had her lungs auscultated topless on the back. Doctor asked her to take deep breathes, and stethed her from top to the base of the chest, then do the same going up

When I worked at a hospital in the US we were required to auscultate through the gown or clothing of females. No choice...

My primary doc, cardiologist and gyno all require me to not have on a bra and they lower my gown for the auscultation. A fewr docs of the past let me leave the bra on, but again more often topless with my docs than not also because most of them would then do a quick breast exam too. Also, I lived in Italy for 13 years and in Europe they are much less prudish than in the US. All my docs there, except one, required I take off my bra for the exam (and they don't invest in patient gowns there for the most part either....). One doc actually started the exam with the bra on and then unhooked it during the sit-up auscultation. Then he had me lie down and without warning just matter-of-factly pulled the bra off by grabbing the shoulder straps and continuing auscultation. After that he examined my nude breasts and nipples manually (no gloves).

I lost my embarrassment after my heart attack and surgery. Medical people have seen it all anyway. Bare skin is the best for auscultation. "If you want your body examined-go to a doctor.If you want your clothes examined-go to a tailor."

Here in the UK most doctors will listen over clothing.

Drjones,

The heart is working against gravity sitting up, unhindered by gravity laying down.

Different irregularities that may or may not lead a physician to discover a problem can more easily be heard sitting up or laying down depending on their type. Aortic regurgitation is diagnosed when a patient holds their breath after emptying their lungs and leaning forward into the stethoscope.

Certain kinds of murmurs are heard more easily laying down, I think.

I think it really does depend on the doctor, and of course what they're listening for. I know of girls who have gone in for something like tonsilitus and ended up being topless and being thoroughly stethed - and then at the other end of the scale a girl who had an ecg was able to keep her bra on - there really seems to be not much rhyme or reason to it at all.

It seems that most of the girls I have approached on this subject seem to think it's 'normal' to have to remove their bras if the heart is going to be involved at all in their examination.

I once got a chest infection and the doctor asked me to strip to the waist, so I took my blouse up and waited. When he looked up and saw I still had my bra on he rather angry told me to take it off.

I wish it was always topless but alas I think most GP's let ladies keep their bra on. Almost universally if it's a sick visit and they don't need to undress.

GF keeps her shirt and bra on. They just put their hand up the shirt or down it.

My doctore asked me to remove my bra and prepare fore an all over exam it felt reall strange it was my first real exam with my doctore .