How to tell a doctor or nurse to speak to me in technical details without being rude

Question

I have regular appointments with nurses and doctors due to a long term but not serious health condition. It's often a new doctor or nurse I see each time so I have to try to judge how best to communicate with each new person.

I'm not a doctor myself, but a data analyst and I've been involved in several research studies and helped to publish two peer reviewed papers on the topic of neutrophil counts. I have a very good understanding of neutrophil counts and other blood test results.

At these appointments I always ask what my neutrophil count was and sometimes other results. Obviously since I've been involved in such thorough research of this topic in the past, I have an immense interest in knowing what my own neutrophil count is, even if it's normal, I just want to know what's going on in my body. It's not really that I'm worried about it, or that I don't trust the doctors, I'm just basically a geek and the value matters to me.

The question is usually just brushed off with a response like "Don't worry it was normal", if I press further and ask "please tell me the number" it may be brushed off again or come across as rude. I've also been told "We don't usually tell people that because only a doctor would understand it".

One method might be to say: "I've worked on several research studies on neutrophil counts, so it's okay, you can tell me the number" But that may come across as immodest and patronising.

How can I ask to just tell me the number without seeming forceful or rude? I don't know if it helps to bring up my past experience or even if there's a way of doing so without seeming immodest or arrogant.

A note on legality or regulations, it's perfectly legal in my country to tell a patient the full details of their blood test results. The hesitation isn't due to regulations.

Answer 1

While it may indeed be seen as rather rude to keep insisting after having been brushed off a few times, I think you could improve your initial request to make the chances of getting an answer slightly bigger.

Instead of just asking for the numbers, also explain your reason for asking before the actual question. In your case, the reason would be that you have some professional curiosity regarding those numbers. There's nothing wrong with mentioning that you work with/research these numbers, and as such are curious what your own, exact, values are, then asking if they could share those with you:

• By explaining a bit more about why you're asking, you're giving recognition to the fact that your request may be slightly unusual, but you're also offering up a circumstance that may make the request less weird. This may decrease the chances of people wanting to brush you off or deny giving you the exact values.
• By making this a preface to the request, you can avoid the immodest or arrogant "who do you think you're talking to" vibe you could give off when only throwing in your professional experience once the question has been brushed off.
• By asking if they could share, there's still the option for them to say they can't, which would avoid a big part of being seen as rude or pushy. Even when there's no real reason to expect a 'no', leaving the possibility open is just seen as polite.

If you can make your request in such a way that it uses specific medical terms, it's also a good sign to any person you're talking with that you have more knowledge than the average Joe on this topic.

The approach has worked very well for me in the past, I like adding a short reason for asking when I suspect the requests I may be making of others may seem unusual. It both boosts my confidence while asking, and I usually seem to get the answers I was looking for. This can go from something simple like requesting stuff at a discount for a charity cause, to getting people to answer more technical questions.

For example, when I see someone working on the electrical grid, I like to go over and ask questions. But I do preface those with saying that I work for a large grid operator too, and I use some of the technical language we share in my questions. That shows the person I'm talking with that I (to an extent) understand their jargon and gives them a baseline to work with.

It might not always work, you might still be told 'all was normal' or encounter people that are uncomfortable sharing specific numbers. Like you said in the comments, there's a whole procedure you are normally to go through to get those numbers, and a hospital may be more bound to those rules than the random people I've interacted with. But there's no harm in trying, there should be little perceived rudeness for just the attempt.