How actually neccesary is for patients to be shirtless while they are on the hospital bed? I see it all the time in movies and shows and, while I obviously prefer it that way, I'm not sure if it's fan service or medically accurate. Does it depend on the kind of injury? Wouldn't it increase the risk of an infection? Don't they ever feel cold??
Its completely and utterly fan service. I’ve spent a lot of time in hospitals (working at them in high school and now doing nursing clinicals in college) and while patients are technically allowed to go shirtless (or wear anything they want, really, as long as we don’t see boobs or genitals hanging out- I walked in on a patient once who was wearing a full formal suit), not many of them choose to. Off the top of my head, I can think of two specific people who weren’t wearing something on their top half- one of them had just had a double lung transplant, and the other had six (yes, six) chest tubes. So mostly it depends on patient preference and comfort. If they feel better shirtless, we’ll get them some scrub bottoms to wear. If patients are unconscious, though, and its our choice, they’re covered up.
Most people get to wear these sexy things while they’re in the hospital:
These are convenient to healthcare professionals because they can be ripped off at a moments’ notice for medical emergencies or (more likely) when they become contaminated with large volumes of bodily fluids. They’re inconvenient to patients because they don’t cover much in the way of backside.Â
I can see why the guy wanted to wear the suit.Â
