At My Wit's End

I'm so mad about that, I could just spit. I'd call the medical board and report it.

There's nothing wrong on your end. You ran into someone else's anxiety, which affected you badly but is her issue, not yours.

For this young student, it's a training issue for what may be an involuntary but nevertheless highly inappropriate reaction. It may be helpful to contact the medical office in writing and request to speak with her supervisor (which may not be that doc). Explain what happened, describe its effect on you as a patient, and ask what the supervisor is going to do to address this as a training issue. That might include discussion, role playing practice, or involvement of her academic supervisor, which could have academic consequences. Ask when this will happen, and ask for a letter from the supervisor documenting the intervention. As someone on the academic side of this type of placement, I would absolutely want to know so I could be corrective and to help evaluate whether this student should be slowed down or counseled out of her program.

The doc's concern is a different matter. I suggest a conversation with the doc (not at an appointment) and if that's not satisfactory, follow-up at his institution.

In any event, you can state that you do not want to be seen by or have anyone in training involved in any part of your care. You will probably need to remind the office of this or check the status of anyone not wearing a badge that identifies their degree.

My mother laughs when she's nervous. She also has a fear of laughing at inappropriate times, which makes her nervous, which makes her laugh at inappropriate times. She started laughing uncontrollably at the funeral for the parent of a family friend but managed to disguise it as crying until the friend told my sister how touched he was that my mother was crying, at which point my sister blew her cover. Thankfully our friend found this to be quite funny.

Anyway that doesn't change the fact that this assistant needs some more work on her bedside manner before she works with patients but as others said, it's a reflection on her, not you.

I would change doctors if he was more concerned about an undergraduate than his patient. Also, in my experience, students are always with the doctor during an appt., not alone with the patient. After our diagnosis, going to the doctor is stressful enough without someone acting inappropriately.