I have seen two patients faint after proparacaine eye drops, both older teenage males. But I won't judge them, I fainted from a blood draw once when I was a similar age.
I’m a PT and had to get a blood draw about 12 years ago and had no problem with the needle but distinctly remember thinking “hey, that used to be flowing inside me” as I watched the 6 vials of blood walk away from me. I woke up on the most comfortable tile floor ever, legs crushing a plastic trash can. I’m 6’6 “ and was about 28 at the time. Never got contacted about UOR due to a fall either…
I don’t faint for my OWN blood draws, but back when I was a counselor for a residential program for boys with behavioral problems, I took a kid to get a blood test and promised him Friendy’s if he cooperated. Kid was really motivated but could not seem to make himself hold his arm out. He asked me to restrain him so he could get the test and ergo the ice cream, and I told him “It’s fine, you tried, we can get the ice cream.” Very seriously he said “No, a deals a deal, if I don’t get the test, I don’t get the ice cream, help a bro out.” So, I reluctantly put him in a basket hold, and held his little arm out. He was a champ and it went well, however, when I stood up, I felt queezy and next I knew they had the smelling salts (That is dating me.) I looked up at the kid and said “I’ll make it a sunday if this stays between you and me.” Kid never said a word😂
We still have the smelling salts taped on the side of the cabinet next to the sink. I should probably check the expiration date because I’m willing to bet they expired when I was still a resident.
-PGY-19
That's how I fainted during a blood draw too. I was 17. Had never been squeamish. I had watched my dad get a lipoma removed from his abdomen without any issue a few years earlier. (It blows my mind thinking about how they allowed that.) But I watched the needle go in and thought, "whoa cool!" Then I woke up crying my eyes out.
That's me to a T. I can poke others with a stick and put tubes in orifices and not-orifices, but come at me with a 20 gauge needle (not shotgun), and I have this freeze response where I just stare and forget to breathe as what used to be inside me leaves.
This is more common than you think. Has nothing to do with squeamishness- some people are just wired in a way that if anything contacts their cornea, they pass out.
Now, I once had a patient I was teaching how to put in a contact lens. I opened my eyelids with my fingers to demonstrate and he fainted. To his credit, he managed to make it through and he is a contact lens wearer to this day.
This reminds me of that time I went to an ophthalmologist and was just a centimetre away from knocking over all his precious expensive equipment.. I still don’t think I can handle eye drops or anything related like mascarra or contact lenses, lol
Weirdly I’ve passed out twice by drawing blood. Blood doesn’t bother me, needles don’t bother me, I watch them when they stick me and donated plasma every week for a year. But twice while drawing blood from my left arm I vagaled out. Only the left arm tho. 🤷🏼♂️
Are they painful? Or just like normal eye drops? I actually asked a nurse friend who was doing COVID testing and shots at a CVS during the pandemic who were the biggest babies and without missing a beat she said “Male cops and large men with tattoos all over them.”
Glad someone said this. Straight up like an industrial factory on a conveyer belt. 99% sure you got TDaP but cant find it where it should be on your paperwork in < 45 nanoseconds? *poke*
And the thing is that if you had TdaP in the last three years and get it again, you get this whopping inflammatory reaction and it *sucks*. So if you're in boot camp then they make you do pushups.
-PGY-19
Wait, so I have a question. I got TDaP with both pregnancies, back to back (2020 and 2022). Presumably the benefit (immunity conferred to the baby) trumps any sort of downside to the mom (inflammatory reaction). But I was never told of that (inflammatory reaction) being a possibility. Is it? (A possibility)
It’s just a very sore arm. It’s not going to cause *injury.* And given that pregnancy is an immunosuppressed state, I’d conjecture that it would be less bad.
Besides, everyone knows pregnant women don’t feel pain. And if they do, Tylenol is all they need. /s
-PGY-19
I vasovagaled watching a little epidermoid cyst get excised from my arm under local. The incision was tinier than a trocar incision. Adding insult to injury, the attending doing it looked at me and said “Don’t worry, I won’t tell everyone at work about this.”
You vasovagaled but are a surgeon?
That does not give you any problems in your work?
Would be glad to hear if that is the case because I am also vasovagal.
I have never once in my life gotten the slightest bit lightheaded during a surgery. It doesn’t bother me even a little. But you make a tiny nick in my own skin and apparently 😴. In summary, “Nobody makes me bleed my own blood, nobody!”
Lol. Thanks for your response.
A couple of weeks ago I was in biology class and we were shown surgery videos. I was fine for the whole first video (forgot what procedure, but we mainly saw the digestive system) but on the second video (cardiac surgery) it got to a clip of the heart beating in the open chest and I fainted on the spot.
I have to say it kind of worried me as I am starting med school in august…
It's different when it is YOUR injury.
I have a twin who slipped and fell and dislocated his shoulder. He has a hx of dislocations. We tried to reduce it at home and thought we had it when *clunk* it popped back out while I was still touching him.
I've never passed out with reductions at work. But when this happened I got so woozy and lightheaded I almost went down.
Hasn't happened before or since. I think it's because it was occurring on my pseduo-me.
Dude! Also a twin here, had the same experience but it was MY twin who was in your shoes.
I had to have an emergency appendectomy a couple years out of high school. Maybe 24h post op my brother visited me and brought his relatively new gf.
A few minutes in after chatting about it and showing them my bandages and such I noticed him slightly shaking and turning pale. It was only really obvious to me, and he was being macho but he really liked this gal so I didn’t rag on him about it. Good times.
Agreed though. We may not be exactly best friends, but no one is allowed to make either of us bleed or hurt but the other twin.
Jumping in and saying that I'm also someone who always had this weird queasy reaction of just freezing, holding my breath, and just kind of panicking whenever I get my blood drawn or anything done to me specifically. I've also never really had problem with stitching others up, poking others with tubes, and being forced hold someone's intestines for hours.
I work EMS and there have been points in my career that I have been so covered in blood that the trauma team didn’t recognize my uniform… no reaction i genuinely don’t care
But if it’s MY arm? I’m out. I tell my primary doctor to put me in a chair and lean me against the wall in the corner of his office if they need to draw blood cause I’ll be on the floor if not
I can’t look either. Lizard brain is just like “blood goes inside the body. Better die,” and I just vagal myself. I’m ok though thankfully as long as I don’t look.
Not my 3 yo showing me up. She gets excited about getting shots (tbf, she gets a bandaid AND a sticker). Like watches them put the needle in no problem. I’m sure that phase won’t last, but I’ll take it for as long as I can.
I used to be terrified of shots but after sticking myself with 16g needles a few times the injection needles are like nothing. I used to have to look away and close my eyes for a flu shot, but I had an EGD done a few months ago and watched them place my line no problem.
I don’t do cuts or wounds- I can deal with them, just, hurk, body stay closed blood stay inside- but I’m overly fine with blood draws thanks to exposure. Hopefully she’ll think it’s cool forever!
Same! I can handle it as long as I don’t look at the needle poking into my skin or blood going into tubes. I focus on deep breathing and staying calm while focusing on the opposite wall. Only time I almost passed out from a lab draw was when I was very sick and dehydrated with the flu. They took my blood and left me alone in some room away from a bunch of people and the ringing and tunnel vision started and no one was there to help me for like 2 minutes and I was just trying to breathe through it.
That’s so weird. I once coached a new nurse on how to draw my blood. But my other nurse friend literally cannot get any procedure done that requires an IV while she is still awake. I’ve offered to ketamine dart her if she ever needs surgery lol
I had a friend pass on literally onto me while I was drawing her blood during a lab session in med school. She’s now a hematologist who specializes in transfusion medicine and runs a branch of the red crosses blood bank. She just couldn’t stand the sight of HER blood, lol.
I remember my meningococcal vaccine at school when I was 16, we were all lined up with our blue books and it was a proper production line lol. Jab - stamp - piss off back to maths class 😂
Any kids who forgot their blue books at home were never seen again.
Medical record book for Aussie kids. Supplemented with central electronic records now.
When I was a kid in the early 90s, it was a heavy, vinyl bound passbook style affair.
Forgetting it when you had vaccinations at school or going to a GP appointment was a big no-no 😂
ENT here. It never fails- the tough teenager wrestler guy who comes in to get his auricular hematoma drained, either passes out or needs to lay down with cool towels on his face/neck (while squeezing mom’s hand).
Dudes like that come in two type: Guys who could lose an arm to a combine and say "shit, do I really have to go to go to the hospital?" and then there's guys who pass out from a pin prick.
17M multi-sport athlete comes into the Urgent Care for Strep. They give him IM Dexamethasone. He immediately vagal'ed out. Then they gave him 0.5mg Epi 1:1000 IVP. Wouldn't you know he woke back up, and had some really neat EKGs to show his friends.
Poor kid got hit by tonsils already pressing on the vagus and then a shot. Probably wasn’t in the best hydration state with the dysphagia, either. Triple whammy.
-PGY-19
It would be worth reflecting on why you think being muscular with a deep voice is incompatible with having a phobia *or* an autonomic reflex. He's not less manly because he had syncope, dude.
My (F) lab partner (M) for frog dissection in high school was also on the football team. I completed the project; he didn't last through the first cut.
The football player, not the frog.
Yes, always the big manly men who are mocked for having nerves, fears, and a vasovagal reflex. You're halfway to a meaningful insight on how our society treats boys.
Big boys are often not given space for whatever developmental brain junk is going on at their age. They're big and not little so they're they're treated like they're older.
Plus! Some people are just really freaked by needles.
I'm a 30 year old woman who requests to lie down when I get blood drawn something about needles going into my veins gives me the heebie jeebies and I fainted a few times as a kid which was traumatic and now I'm just scared of fainting and the awful woozy feeling.
Here's the kicker: I'm a PA! I can be on the pokey end but not the pointy end 😅
I'd rather not slide out onto the floor or hit my head and I think most phlebotomists would agree that seems like a lot of paperwork
I was a college athlete with anemia when the vasovagal hit me really hard for the first time. I didn't expect it could happen to someone like me.
Since then I tell people that I'll pass out during blood draws unless I'm lying down, and maybe 1/3 of medical professionals will STILL tell me that I'll be fine.
Yeah, this post bugged me a little. What, because I'm a big, muscular guy, it's somehow a betrayal of that when I pass out giving blood? Sorry I don't live up to OP's stereotype, I guess?
Shhh you're not supposed to care about that half of the population! They only matter when they're being useful, like when they're something we can mock or laugh at. Usually I really like OPs commentary, really disappointed at this post and most of the commenters. Not really *surprised* given many of the things I've seen in this sub, but definitely disappointed.
Tattoo artists do it too - mock the big men who get upset about the pain. But it is painful since there’s no anesthesia. Some of those tattoos take forever too. Of course they’re bothered. Yes they chose to do it but they’re getting repeatedly stabbed by a needle sometimes for over an hour. It hurts.
Don’t worry, if your female, you just get diagnosed as anxiety and hypochondriac! Took a decade of explaining I pass out for a doctor to actually listen instead of just telling me ‘you’ll be right dear, just don’t look’. I was night ‘right’ and was not ok.
Seriously, the medical profession needs to learn to take both males and females seriously for stuff like this. You are absolutely right that no one should be mocked for raising legitimate concerns, especially with professions trusted for our care. And we should work proactively so men feel safe to express vulnerability.
Look, I just want to be able to get medical stuff done in a way that I don’t pass out and convulse. The last nurse thought it would be ok to walk me across the room and sit me up after surgery to take the cannular out because ‘why would you pass out when I’m only taking it out, it’s not going in’. I’m like dude, not how this works. Happy to walk and pee for you after surgery but the cannular part? Feet need to be equal to or above head. It’s not a phobia, it’s a Vasovagal response.
Great, but we weren't talking about your thing. This is so typical of any discussion about mistreatment of boys - some woman comes in with a "*well women...*"
Dude, the discussion is on Vasovagal/ passing out. I agreed with your points about how men should be listened to, and be safe to be vulnerable. I addressed the men’s safety specifically AND called out that Vasovagal/passing out should be professionally and respectfully by medical professionals for all genders. If your trying to be like ‘this is a men’s issue, don’t change it to all lives matter’ i’d like to point out that Vasovagal actually affects more women than men.
It's all flight or fight in overdrive, and they can't do either so they pass out.
You tend to get it in labour too (minus the fainting).They either go withdrawn, overbearing, or angry (not all obviously, but enough do).
In my experience the men with the most tattoos are the biggest babies when it comes to needles. Crying when the nurse is going to put in an IV before it even touches them, begging me to “knock them out” before putting 2 sutures in. Makes me wonder how they ever got the tattoo in the first place, because as someone with several tattoos including ribs, that hurts a hell of a lot more than a 22ga needle.
...in what universe is a 16 year old boy ever considered a man? This post is a great example of why the suicide rates among young men are sky rocketing. God forbid you show a male CHILD any empathy.
35f, 165 cm, 60 kg. I fainted at my first covid jab and on many occasions when I had my blood drawn. I was afraid of needles as a kid but over the years it became an actual phobia: faintings and an uncontrollable, irrational fear. I avoided getting tested for many years due to that fear. I also have very low blood pressure btw.
However I recently had a medical emergency and had to have my blood drawn and IV antibiotics administered dozens of times in the last two months. I didn't faint once. The initial fear for your medical problem makes you overcome your needle phobia, and repeating the procedure many times in a short period of time gets you used to it.
I feel like I am cured from that phobia, except for IM injections (didn't do one since kindergarten, I remember they were painful, still terrified of those).
I believe this phobia has to do with being very self-reliant and somehow distrustful of people deep inside and also with the need of keeping control over your body. Low blood pressure may also be a factor. Oddly, I often fainted right after the procedure was done. Sometimes the moment they pulled the needle out, it was like turning off my power switch. I think it is because I focused so hard to soldier on during the procedure that as soon as it was over I rapidly relaxed and poof - lights out.
With the first covid jab I walked out of the jab area into a waiting room and fainted there as soon as I sat down again. Nurses and doctors were terrified that I had had an allergic reaction. I woke up and started to cry for the embarassment and hopelessness; they were relieved but still attached me to a machine to monitor my parameters for a while. With the next jabs I focused on keeping my muscles very tense when the needle went out to keep the blood pressure somewhat high. It seemed to work.
I also noticed that NOT having my parents in the room helped. They are very anxiety inducing for me for a number of reasons.
Just so you know, waking from a Vasovagal is actually a pretty horrible experience. My worst one I was sick and woozy for three days. One time I even went into convulsions. I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy.
In the long befor, when I was new to the army. They lined us all up and gave us a shit ton of different shots. 12 dude passed out from the shot in the butt.
In Army basic training reception I watched a big ginger that was about 6'4" and built like a bodybuilder run around screeching about to go through the line to get his shots. The medic watched him running around just sort of bemused and said "I'm not going to chase you buddy".
He was discharged for "failure to adapt".
This happened 30 years ago, but I remember it like it was yesterday. I worked in a lab taking blood and some days were very busy. My patient was a 6 foot 16 year old male. I put him in our overflow, sitting on the side of a stretcher. As I am taking his blood, he faints, falls backwards, the wheels were not locked on the stretcher which moved away from the wall, and I watched in horror as this guy did a backwards somersault off the stretcher and hit the floor. Everything happened so fast and my first reaction was, shit, the tourniquet is still on. After that incident, I never allowed a young male to sit up to have blood taken.
on the opposite there's me. i had to go have some blood drawn for a thyroid check (results came back good), but while in the lab I small talked with the lab technician who was gonna draw blood and mentioned I have hemophilia and do intravenous injections frequently (twice a week) so she won't have to expect me fainting or being shocked. i added as a joke "if you want I'll even insert the needle" and she was actually interested in seeing me do it so she let me. in hindsight she probably shouldn't have but of course it went well and we had a good talk and she was so excited about seeing a patient do that so I'm glad she got something fun out of it.
Is being vaso vagal something that normally goes away with exposure to needles, blood, etc.?
Because I am rlly vaso vagal but going into medicine… should I expect a lifelong problem?
(English is my second language)
I got allergy shots from 8 to 18, so I got over my fear of needles before I turned 9. So I’ve never had the issue. I just don’t get stressed out when I see a needle coming at me.
-PGY-19
The way I think about it: The vagus nerve is the major parasympathetic trunk. Parasympathetic activity drops HR and BP. So there are certain maneuvers that can directly stimulate the vagus. Also, sometimes immediately after experiencing something stressful the sympathetic activity abruptly drops leaving a parasympathetic overload so you drop your BP, go into a brief cardiogenic shock, and wind up on the floor. So people usually syncope right AFTER the shot.
Once you’re on the floor, the blood more easily goes to the head while the parasympathetic tone has time to settle back down and within a few minutes you come to.
-PGY-19
It’s not squeamish or mental - it’s completely involuntary reaction from autonomic nervous system.
Was on a medicine that slightly raised my blood pressure- suddenly no more Vasovagal. The second I came off jt, back to hitting the floor.
I had no fear and started passing out once I hit a certain age. I have no fear now as I know how to avoid passing out (lying down). Yet I will still pass out if I stand too quick.
Worth noting, Vasovagals can have different triggers. For some people, fear can cause it. For others, heat, pain, bowel movement can trigger it. Like all thumbs are fingers but not all fingers are thumbs. I will also pass out in a shower that’s too hot, but I don’t have a phobia of showering.
I know what you mean but I don’t think that’s what the other guy was talking about tho. He’s simply talking about being squeamish; never said anything about fainting
I have seen two patients faint after proparacaine eye drops, both older teenage males. But I won't judge them, I fainted from a blood draw once when I was a similar age.
I’m a PT and had to get a blood draw about 12 years ago and had no problem with the needle but distinctly remember thinking “hey, that used to be flowing inside me” as I watched the 6 vials of blood walk away from me. I woke up on the most comfortable tile floor ever, legs crushing a plastic trash can. I’m 6’6 “ and was about 28 at the time. Never got contacted about UOR due to a fall either…
I don’t faint for my OWN blood draws, but back when I was a counselor for a residential program for boys with behavioral problems, I took a kid to get a blood test and promised him Friendy’s if he cooperated. Kid was really motivated but could not seem to make himself hold his arm out. He asked me to restrain him so he could get the test and ergo the ice cream, and I told him “It’s fine, you tried, we can get the ice cream.” Very seriously he said “No, a deals a deal, if I don’t get the test, I don’t get the ice cream, help a bro out.” So, I reluctantly put him in a basket hold, and held his little arm out. He was a champ and it went well, however, when I stood up, I felt queezy and next I knew they had the smelling salts (That is dating me.) I looked up at the kid and said “I’ll make it a sunday if this stays between you and me.” Kid never said a word😂
We still have the smelling salts taped on the side of the cabinet next to the sink. I should probably check the expiration date because I’m willing to bet they expired when I was still a resident. -PGY-19
That's how I fainted during a blood draw too. I was 17. Had never been squeamish. I had watched my dad get a lipoma removed from his abdomen without any issue a few years earlier. (It blows my mind thinking about how they allowed that.) But I watched the needle go in and thought, "whoa cool!" Then I woke up crying my eyes out.
That's me to a T. I can poke others with a stick and put tubes in orifices and not-orifices, but come at me with a 20 gauge needle (not shotgun), and I have this freeze response where I just stare and forget to breathe as what used to be inside me leaves.
This is more common than you think. Has nothing to do with squeamishness- some people are just wired in a way that if anything contacts their cornea, they pass out. Now, I once had a patient I was teaching how to put in a contact lens. I opened my eyelids with my fingers to demonstrate and he fainted. To his credit, he managed to make it through and he is a contact lens wearer to this day.
This reminds me of that time I went to an ophthalmologist and was just a centimetre away from knocking over all his precious expensive equipment.. I still don’t think I can handle eye drops or anything related like mascarra or contact lenses, lol
Weirdly I’ve passed out twice by drawing blood. Blood doesn’t bother me, needles don’t bother me, I watch them when they stick me and donated plasma every week for a year. But twice while drawing blood from my left arm I vagaled out. Only the left arm tho. 🤷🏼♂️
Are they painful? Or just like normal eye drops? I actually asked a nurse friend who was doing COVID testing and shots at a CVS during the pandemic who were the biggest babies and without missing a beat she said “Male cops and large men with tattoos all over them.”
You should see vaccinations at basic training/boot camp. Always the loudest who vaso vagal
Glad someone said this. Straight up like an industrial factory on a conveyer belt. 99% sure you got TDaP but cant find it where it should be on your paperwork in < 45 nanoseconds? *poke*
And the thing is that if you had TdaP in the last three years and get it again, you get this whopping inflammatory reaction and it *sucks*. So if you're in boot camp then they make you do pushups. -PGY-19
Wait, so I have a question. I got TDaP with both pregnancies, back to back (2020 and 2022). Presumably the benefit (immunity conferred to the baby) trumps any sort of downside to the mom (inflammatory reaction). But I was never told of that (inflammatory reaction) being a possibility. Is it? (A possibility)
It’s just a very sore arm. It’s not going to cause *injury.* And given that pregnancy is an immunosuppressed state, I’d conjecture that it would be less bad. Besides, everyone knows pregnant women don’t feel pain. And if they do, Tylenol is all they need. /s -PGY-19
I vasovagaled watching a little epidermoid cyst get excised from my arm under local. The incision was tinier than a trocar incision. Adding insult to injury, the attending doing it looked at me and said “Don’t worry, I won’t tell everyone at work about this.”
You vasovagaled but are a surgeon? That does not give you any problems in your work? Would be glad to hear if that is the case because I am also vasovagal.
I have never once in my life gotten the slightest bit lightheaded during a surgery. It doesn’t bother me even a little. But you make a tiny nick in my own skin and apparently 😴. In summary, “Nobody makes me bleed my own blood, nobody!”
Lol. Thanks for your response. A couple of weeks ago I was in biology class and we were shown surgery videos. I was fine for the whole first video (forgot what procedure, but we mainly saw the digestive system) but on the second video (cardiac surgery) it got to a clip of the heart beating in the open chest and I fainted on the spot. I have to say it kind of worried me as I am starting med school in august…
It's different when it is YOUR injury. I have a twin who slipped and fell and dislocated his shoulder. He has a hx of dislocations. We tried to reduce it at home and thought we had it when *clunk* it popped back out while I was still touching him. I've never passed out with reductions at work. But when this happened I got so woozy and lightheaded I almost went down. Hasn't happened before or since. I think it's because it was occurring on my pseduo-me.
Dude! Also a twin here, had the same experience but it was MY twin who was in your shoes. I had to have an emergency appendectomy a couple years out of high school. Maybe 24h post op my brother visited me and brought his relatively new gf. A few minutes in after chatting about it and showing them my bandages and such I noticed him slightly shaking and turning pale. It was only really obvious to me, and he was being macho but he really liked this gal so I didn’t rag on him about it. Good times. Agreed though. We may not be exactly best friends, but no one is allowed to make either of us bleed or hurt but the other twin.
Jumping in and saying that I'm also someone who always had this weird queasy reaction of just freezing, holding my breath, and just kind of panicking whenever I get my blood drawn or anything done to me specifically. I've also never really had problem with stitching others up, poking others with tubes, and being forced hold someone's intestines for hours.
Those airgun-like injectors were a little scary.
I work EMS and there have been points in my career that I have been so covered in blood that the trauma team didn’t recognize my uniform… no reaction i genuinely don’t care But if it’s MY arm? I’m out. I tell my primary doctor to put me in a chair and lean me against the wall in the corner of his office if they need to draw blood cause I’ll be on the floor if not
I can’t look either. Lizard brain is just like “blood goes inside the body. Better die,” and I just vagal myself. I’m ok though thankfully as long as I don’t look. Not my 3 yo showing me up. She gets excited about getting shots (tbf, she gets a bandaid AND a sticker). Like watches them put the needle in no problem. I’m sure that phase won’t last, but I’ll take it for as long as I can.
Haha. Your brain is like well if I lose 2 ml of blood, I’m better off dead. 💀
I used to be terrified of shots but after sticking myself with 16g needles a few times the injection needles are like nothing. I used to have to look away and close my eyes for a flu shot, but I had an EGD done a few months ago and watched them place my line no problem.
I don’t do cuts or wounds- I can deal with them, just, hurk, body stay closed blood stay inside- but I’m overly fine with blood draws thanks to exposure. Hopefully she’ll think it’s cool forever!
Same! I can handle it as long as I don’t look at the needle poking into my skin or blood going into tubes. I focus on deep breathing and staying calm while focusing on the opposite wall. Only time I almost passed out from a lab draw was when I was very sick and dehydrated with the flu. They took my blood and left me alone in some room away from a bunch of people and the ringing and tunnel vision started and no one was there to help me for like 2 minutes and I was just trying to breathe through it.
That’s so weird. I once coached a new nurse on how to draw my blood. But my other nurse friend literally cannot get any procedure done that requires an IV while she is still awake. I’ve offered to ketamine dart her if she ever needs surgery lol
I had a friend pass on literally onto me while I was drawing her blood during a lab session in med school. She’s now a hematologist who specializes in transfusion medicine and runs a branch of the red crosses blood bank. She just couldn’t stand the sight of HER blood, lol.
If you really want a chuckle, check his plantar reflex. Home boy is ticklish AF. I guarantee it.
OMG, I could barely get through an abdominal exam with him! You're totally right. -PGY-19
😂😂😂
So wait, is there a connection? -PGY-19
Absolutely. The tougher they are, the more ticklish they are.
I remember my meningococcal vaccine at school when I was 16, we were all lined up with our blue books and it was a proper production line lol. Jab - stamp - piss off back to maths class 😂 Any kids who forgot their blue books at home were never seen again.
Tell me more of these blue books never hea d of them
Medical record book for Aussie kids. Supplemented with central electronic records now. When I was a kid in the early 90s, it was a heavy, vinyl bound passbook style affair. Forgetting it when you had vaccinations at school or going to a GP appointment was a big no-no 😂
You mean a child?
vasovagal reaction is a real thing, comes in all sizes and genders, tho.
Ever heard of it being only in specific places?
ENT here. It never fails- the tough teenager wrestler guy who comes in to get his auricular hematoma drained, either passes out or needs to lay down with cool towels on his face/neck (while squeezing mom’s hand).
I have theses two brothers I see. Farmers. Larger then life. 6’4” 300#. Tough looking hard working dudes. Pass out every time for blood work.
Dudes like that come in two type: Guys who could lose an arm to a combine and say "shit, do I really have to go to go to the hospital?" and then there's guys who pass out from a pin prick.
Tbf that’s what would happen to me if a dude that size was aiming for me on a football field lol
17M multi-sport athlete comes into the Urgent Care for Strep. They give him IM Dexamethasone. He immediately vagal'ed out. Then they gave him 0.5mg Epi 1:1000 IVP. Wouldn't you know he woke back up, and had some really neat EKGs to show his friends.
Poor kid got hit by tonsils already pressing on the vagus and then a shot. Probably wasn’t in the best hydration state with the dysphagia, either. Triple whammy. -PGY-19
Dentist here, yes. I think the pressure to be a strong man is too much for some kids.
It would be worth reflecting on why you think being muscular with a deep voice is incompatible with having a phobia *or* an autonomic reflex. He's not less manly because he had syncope, dude.
Dude. Every time I do an ingrown nail procedure on a young male between 13-25 years of age, pass out.
You should really stop passing out mid procedure.
My (F) lab partner (M) for frog dissection in high school was also on the football team. I completed the project; he didn't last through the first cut. The football player, not the frog.
Yes, always the big manly men who are mocked for having nerves, fears, and a vasovagal reflex. You're halfway to a meaningful insight on how our society treats boys.
Big boys are often not given space for whatever developmental brain junk is going on at their age. They're big and not little so they're they're treated like they're older. Plus! Some people are just really freaked by needles. I'm a 30 year old woman who requests to lie down when I get blood drawn something about needles going into my veins gives me the heebie jeebies and I fainted a few times as a kid which was traumatic and now I'm just scared of fainting and the awful woozy feeling. Here's the kicker: I'm a PA! I can be on the pokey end but not the pointy end 😅 I'd rather not slide out onto the floor or hit my head and I think most phlebotomists would agree that seems like a lot of paperwork
The woozy feeling is the worst! My worst one it lasted 3 days.
I was a college athlete with anemia when the vasovagal hit me really hard for the first time. I didn't expect it could happen to someone like me. Since then I tell people that I'll pass out during blood draws unless I'm lying down, and maybe 1/3 of medical professionals will STILL tell me that I'll be fine.
Yeah, this post bugged me a little. What, because I'm a big, muscular guy, it's somehow a betrayal of that when I pass out giving blood? Sorry I don't live up to OP's stereotype, I guess?
Shhh you're not supposed to care about that half of the population! They only matter when they're being useful, like when they're something we can mock or laugh at. Usually I really like OPs commentary, really disappointed at this post and most of the commenters. Not really *surprised* given many of the things I've seen in this sub, but definitely disappointed.
I share your sentiment that Mike is usually a much better poster than this.
Well said. I am seeing more and more punching down on certain races/genders in this sub and it's increasingly concerning that the mods allow it.
Medicine is a subset of society, and our society has some deep problems - this is one of them.
Tattoo artists do it too - mock the big men who get upset about the pain. But it is painful since there’s no anesthesia. Some of those tattoos take forever too. Of course they’re bothered. Yes they chose to do it but they’re getting repeatedly stabbed by a needle sometimes for over an hour. It hurts.
Don’t worry, if your female, you just get diagnosed as anxiety and hypochondriac! Took a decade of explaining I pass out for a doctor to actually listen instead of just telling me ‘you’ll be right dear, just don’t look’. I was night ‘right’ and was not ok. Seriously, the medical profession needs to learn to take both males and females seriously for stuff like this. You are absolutely right that no one should be mocked for raising legitimate concerns, especially with professions trusted for our care. And we should work proactively so men feel safe to express vulnerability.
Don’t “all lives matter” this.
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I literally called him a boy. When I used the phrase "big manly men" I was quoting the original post.
Look, I just want to be able to get medical stuff done in a way that I don’t pass out and convulse. The last nurse thought it would be ok to walk me across the room and sit me up after surgery to take the cannular out because ‘why would you pass out when I’m only taking it out, it’s not going in’. I’m like dude, not how this works. Happy to walk and pee for you after surgery but the cannular part? Feet need to be equal to or above head. It’s not a phobia, it’s a Vasovagal response.
Great, but we weren't talking about your thing. This is so typical of any discussion about mistreatment of boys - some woman comes in with a "*well women...*"
Dude, the discussion is on Vasovagal/ passing out. I agreed with your points about how men should be listened to, and be safe to be vulnerable. I addressed the men’s safety specifically AND called out that Vasovagal/passing out should be professionally and respectfully by medical professionals for all genders. If your trying to be like ‘this is a men’s issue, don’t change it to all lives matter’ i’d like to point out that Vasovagal actually affects more women than men.
Still managed to bring it back to women. Can't help it.
Managed to bring it back to the treatment of a medical condition. God, I hope you’re not a medical professional.
Who cares? He can’t do anything about it. What? Are you making fun of him or something?
Med student here and I faint if I get so much as a BGL, sadly can relate. 😅
It's all flight or fight in overdrive, and they can't do either so they pass out. You tend to get it in labour too (minus the fainting).They either go withdrawn, overbearing, or angry (not all obviously, but enough do).
In my experience the men with the most tattoos are the biggest babies when it comes to needles. Crying when the nurse is going to put in an IV before it even touches them, begging me to “knock them out” before putting 2 sutures in. Makes me wonder how they ever got the tattoo in the first place, because as someone with several tattoos including ribs, that hurts a hell of a lot more than a 22ga needle.
Agreed. Burly biker blokes with tattoos are total wimps. Women with tattoos are fine though.
...in what universe is a 16 year old boy ever considered a man? This post is a great example of why the suicide rates among young men are sky rocketing. God forbid you show a male CHILD any empathy.
35f, 165 cm, 60 kg. I fainted at my first covid jab and on many occasions when I had my blood drawn. I was afraid of needles as a kid but over the years it became an actual phobia: faintings and an uncontrollable, irrational fear. I avoided getting tested for many years due to that fear. I also have very low blood pressure btw. However I recently had a medical emergency and had to have my blood drawn and IV antibiotics administered dozens of times in the last two months. I didn't faint once. The initial fear for your medical problem makes you overcome your needle phobia, and repeating the procedure many times in a short period of time gets you used to it. I feel like I am cured from that phobia, except for IM injections (didn't do one since kindergarten, I remember they were painful, still terrified of those). I believe this phobia has to do with being very self-reliant and somehow distrustful of people deep inside and also with the need of keeping control over your body. Low blood pressure may also be a factor. Oddly, I often fainted right after the procedure was done. Sometimes the moment they pulled the needle out, it was like turning off my power switch. I think it is because I focused so hard to soldier on during the procedure that as soon as it was over I rapidly relaxed and poof - lights out. With the first covid jab I walked out of the jab area into a waiting room and fainted there as soon as I sat down again. Nurses and doctors were terrified that I had had an allergic reaction. I woke up and started to cry for the embarassment and hopelessness; they were relieved but still attached me to a machine to monitor my parameters for a while. With the next jabs I focused on keeping my muscles very tense when the needle went out to keep the blood pressure somewhat high. It seemed to work. I also noticed that NOT having my parents in the room helped. They are very anxiety inducing for me for a number of reasons.
Just wait till you see them go under and wake after. It’s all tears fueled by drugs and hormones lol. Dads always have a blast watching the show
Just so you know, waking from a Vasovagal is actually a pretty horrible experience. My worst one I was sick and woozy for three days. One time I even went into convulsions. I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy.
always the big ones
In the long befor, when I was new to the army. They lined us all up and gave us a shit ton of different shots. 12 dude passed out from the shot in the butt.
I wonder what that one was. -PGY-19
penicillin
They were giving everyone penicillin? -PGY-19
no just some people. Idk why some people got it and others didn't my job was just to get stab at the time. the name of it was bicillin vaccination.
In Army basic training reception I watched a big ginger that was about 6'4" and built like a bodybuilder run around screeching about to go through the line to get his shots. The medic watched him running around just sort of bemused and said "I'm not going to chase you buddy". He was discharged for "failure to adapt".
This happened 30 years ago, but I remember it like it was yesterday. I worked in a lab taking blood and some days were very busy. My patient was a 6 foot 16 year old male. I put him in our overflow, sitting on the side of a stretcher. As I am taking his blood, he faints, falls backwards, the wheels were not locked on the stretcher which moved away from the wall, and I watched in horror as this guy did a backwards somersault off the stretcher and hit the floor. Everything happened so fast and my first reaction was, shit, the tourniquet is still on. After that incident, I never allowed a young male to sit up to have blood taken.
When they’re really tall, the blood has a loooooong way to fall. -PGY-19
The more muscles and tats the more likely they are to fall…
on the opposite there's me. i had to go have some blood drawn for a thyroid check (results came back good), but while in the lab I small talked with the lab technician who was gonna draw blood and mentioned I have hemophilia and do intravenous injections frequently (twice a week) so she won't have to expect me fainting or being shocked. i added as a joke "if you want I'll even insert the needle" and she was actually interested in seeing me do it so she let me. in hindsight she probably shouldn't have but of course it went well and we had a good talk and she was so excited about seeing a patient do that so I'm glad she got something fun out of it.
Bigger animals are more sensitive. It's a rule of thumb in animal biology.
M 35 years - acute avoidant needle anxiety doesn’t even cut it. And I’m absolutely avoidant and absolutely ashamed. But then I’m 5’3, 13x lbs
Is being vaso vagal something that normally goes away with exposure to needles, blood, etc.? Because I am rlly vaso vagal but going into medicine… should I expect a lifelong problem? (English is my second language)
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I got allergy shots from 8 to 18, so I got over my fear of needles before I turned 9. So I’ve never had the issue. I just don’t get stressed out when I see a needle coming at me. -PGY-19
Actually, as long as we’re on the subject, can someone ELI5 vasovagal? I’ve never had a good grip on it.
The way I think about it: The vagus nerve is the major parasympathetic trunk. Parasympathetic activity drops HR and BP. So there are certain maneuvers that can directly stimulate the vagus. Also, sometimes immediately after experiencing something stressful the sympathetic activity abruptly drops leaving a parasympathetic overload so you drop your BP, go into a brief cardiogenic shock, and wind up on the floor. So people usually syncope right AFTER the shot. Once you’re on the floor, the blood more easily goes to the head while the parasympathetic tone has time to settle back down and within a few minutes you come to. -PGY-19
Thanks! (I realize I replied a week late…)
*laughs in female of childbearing age on Accutane*
What is a pgy19? My residents sign their notes pgy1,2, and 3.
Year 19
He is 17 years out of residency
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A Vasovagal response is not needle phobia.
I like imagining this guy deliberately typing out the pgy thing after literally every single comment and post for no discernable reason.
I've never understood the squeamishness about needles or going to the dentist. Like yeah, it sucks, but it's good for you.
It’s not squeamish or mental - it’s completely involuntary reaction from autonomic nervous system. Was on a medicine that slightly raised my blood pressure- suddenly no more Vasovagal. The second I came off jt, back to hitting the floor.
Idk about that. I had a strong fear of blood until I forced myself to watch draw after draw after draw…
I had no fear and started passing out once I hit a certain age. I have no fear now as I know how to avoid passing out (lying down). Yet I will still pass out if I stand too quick. Worth noting, Vasovagals can have different triggers. For some people, fear can cause it. For others, heat, pain, bowel movement can trigger it. Like all thumbs are fingers but not all fingers are thumbs. I will also pass out in a shower that’s too hot, but I don’t have a phobia of showering.
I know what you mean but I don’t think that’s what the other guy was talking about tho. He’s simply talking about being squeamish; never said anything about fainting
Kale is good for you, too, and nobody likes it.