Please don't touch me there: the ethics of intimate examinations: how medical students are being taught at University of Antwerp.

BMJ VOLUME 326 14 JUNE bmj.com to walk by a physiotherapist. This article is dangerous in that it isolates vaginal or rectal examinations as being intimate examinations. Every medical examination is intimate, which medical students soon appreciate. Examination of the fundus of the uterus is just as intimate for a gynaecologist as examining the fundus of the eye is to an ophthalmologist. Doctors welcome people to a clinic and during the course of consultation and examination look at the pathology and not the person. Medical training is all about understanding this difference. A mole on a cheek is a beauty spot at a party but a potential melanoma in a clinic. Researchers would find that most former medical students are not overburdened by their emotions during the course of such intimate examinations.