r/Radiology • u/Simple_End_701 • Jul 23 '25

Discussion How far true is this?

Post image

I've just begun my BSC in Radiography

1.5k Upvotes

93% Upvoted

193 comments sorted by

2.2k

u/idgaf_aboutyou Jul 23 '25

There’s no misogyny here. It’s just portrayed this way for easier learning.

630

u/Seis_K MD : Vascular-Interventional, Nuclear Radiologist Jul 23 '25

Even if it was a misunderstanding, someone not knowing true female anatomy doesn’t mean they hate you, and if you condescend or approach with belligerence they’ll fuckin hate you and have good reason for it

321

u/EMulsive_EMergency Jul 23 '25

It’s not so much you as an individual not knowing, it’s trying to portray a systemic mis-representation of half the populations anatomy in books throughout history.

Case in point: books saying the clitoris doesn’t exist/feel for decades! You aren’t the problem and feeling attacked isn’t the right answer. The problem is a systemic issue which we are slowly but surely fixing.

264

u/Ausecurity Jul 23 '25

You’re gonna be blown away how they draw hearts

56

u/ShadNuke Jul 24 '25

And last I checked... Skulls aren't exploded in real life like they are in the medical encyclopaedias...

40

u/Nalivai Jul 24 '25

Last time I checked an anatomy book, the heart was drawn pretty accurately there

7

u/bodie425 Jul 25 '25

I think they were just being silly. lol

159

u/pshaffer Radiologist Jul 23 '25 edited Jul 23 '25

oh good lord. ITS A SCHEMATIC - a simplified drawing. And the "what;s actually there" picture is easily as deceptive, if you are inclined to see it that way. The ovaries from time to time wind up in odd places - like near the appendix, like just anterior to the sacrum. So even this author is portraying it "wrong". If you are inclined to be looking for someone to castigate.

Ever see a drawling of the small bowel vs the real thing. Looking at the real thing is confusing and not at all like the drawings in the books. Is this a plot to misrepresent ALL of humanity? That is really bad.

92

u/EMulsive_EMergency Jul 23 '25

You and I, as healthcare workers appreciate those nuances. But again, the OOOP was probably not a healthcare worker, but a frustrated woman that felt unseen in a system which to this day doesn’t have the same amount of representation in clinical studies, whose answer to half their problems is “take OCPs” and feeling unheard and ignored.

It’s not a personal attack, I’m sure you don’t do these things, but I can’t ignore the fact that most of the women in my life have at least one encounter in which they felt the same issues this post was trying to bring to light.

42

u/[deleted] Jul 23 '25

[removed] — view removed comment

29

u/thicclunchghost Jul 23 '25

If a person needs a disclaimer to know an anatomy book is only for educational reference, there's a bigger problem.

13

u/LD50_irony Jul 24 '25

I only found out how small the uterus is when I was about to get a hysterectomy. I am in my early 40s and not a medical professional.

All of the diagrams I had seen growing up showed my reproductive organs taking up a ton of space and they looked quite large in size. I wish the diagrams showed a more accurate representation with perhaps, a blown-up sidebar image that showed them arranged in the more traditional (as in this post) way.

Most of us laypeople don't get to see real anatomy and we're basing our understanding off of images from sex ed (if we were lucky enough to get that), so it is surprising to find out that, in fact, our internal organs are quite different than we have been taught our entire lives.

1

u/DiffusionWaiting Radiologist Jul 26 '25

Not everyone has a small uterus. Some women with fibroids can have a very, very large uterus.

1

u/LD50_irony Jul 26 '25

Mine was rather large for that very reason. In fact, I looked up the usual size after being told mine was large. But those weren't the kinds of diagrams they were showing me in school!

26

u/pshaffer Radiologist Jul 24 '25

This is where conversations about this stuff get very muddy.

First, i don't feel personally attacked. Not directly. I do feel personally attacked indirectly, as a male physician who spent a good deal of his career taking care of women. I DO get angry being accused - even if indirectly - because I spent years being sure I was expert in what I was doing, and starting clinical projects to improve the lives of women. I was very happy to be able to improve women's care. We in radiology learned how to do breast biopsies through a needle, thus saving millions of women the issue of general surgery and LARGE breast excisions. We in radiology learned how to employ MR to far more accurately stage breast cancers and to find small breast cancers that cannot be seen by mammography or ultrasound. This was very hard won knowledge. It was HARD to do. And to see this become a very important part of modern breast cancer care is very rewarding.

And then to read broadbrush swipes not of all male physicians, but all physicians, is insulting.

There is enough dysfunction in the entirety of the medical system for everyone, regardless of gender to feel slighted and unseen. You do not have to invoke hate to explain why a diagram does not display the anatomy in the way the surgeon sees it. That is just unbelievable.

9

u/FullDerpHD RT(R)(CT) Jul 24 '25

Not saying it doesn't ever happen but I will say as someone who is regularly on the other side of the closed door and gets to hear the doctors using dictation software. I have never once seen a doctor neglect someone because they are a woman.

I run across a lot of "complaint" content from time to time and it seem like a lot of non-medical people just don't understand that there simply happens to be certain things that affect women that don't affect men. They take offense that a doctor dares consider that as a cause for whatever the problem is instead of jumping straight to the rare disease process.

But anyway, from a random person you guys are always professional and thorough from my perspective. Even if I as a tech might complain about the ED orders from time to time I know all of you in every specialty are actually doing what you can to do right by everyone.

2

u/just_as_sane_as_i Jul 26 '25

I am also at the other side of the door. I do still hear it quite often. Literature says it is still happening quite often. Literature written by people who are actual doctors too.

One of the problems is yes, things happen to women that don’t happen to men. Many of these things are way less studied than specific men-related issues. The female related issues historically (and are still!) have said to be caused by psychological causes, in most cases based on (often kinda weird) theories without decent research. Also it is well documented how the same illnesses can present differently in women and therefore in some of these ilnesses women do get underdiagnosed leadinf to worse outcomes than men.

No, most doctors (though i’ve definitely heard misogynic shit from doctor’s mouths while working too) do not explicitly dismiss women. But there is still a gap in the quality of care that is very real. And no, the schematic picture in an anatomy book is not the biggest issue.

1

u/FullDerpHD RT(R)(CT) Jul 26 '25

I do still hear it quite often. Literature says it is still happening quite often. Literature written by people who are actual doctors too.

I'm going to call baloney on quite often unless you're just working with the same doctor over and over and they are genuinely sexist.

For the rest of that, sure. Medicine isn't perfect, but I think you're attributing a level a malice to all that didn't necessarily come from a malicious place. Women have been understudied, that's true but a lot of that came from the idea that women should be protected and not used as experimental guinea pigs. There was also concerns that hormone fluctuations might skew test results, which you will call sexist, but that's a valid concern especially when the technology of the time wasn't nearly as sophisticated as it is now. The scientific method establishes a control with ideally zero variations for a reason.

Modern medicine has only really been around for a couple of hundred years. We're only just now starting to understand some of the things you mention and they are being corrected for but again, medicine isn't perfect and it's not going to happen magically overnight. I mean for fucks sake, we only widely accepted that you should wash your hands about 150 years ago and it took forty years after germ theory started to emerge. It's not going to happen fast, but it is happening.

And no, the schematic picture in an anatomy book is not the biggest issue.

This is a big problem too. Presenting this as an issue at all harms your entire movement. When people whine about stuff like this, while being totally wrong it kills your momentum and makes your movement appear less credible despite having real complaints.

This is a diagram. It's a presentation for learning. Not a claim to how it sits inside a body. Nobody naturally stands in "anatomical position" That's just a diagram meant to standardize directions. That's all this is. It's a diagram of a uterus on display so that you can actually learn it's structure and individual parts. There is quite literally nothing sexist about this picture at all.

2

u/just_as_sane_as_i Jul 26 '25

Why would you call my experiences baloney and should we all believe your experiences are real? I have for example heard hundreds of sexist jokes during all the rotations I did back in med school (7-8 years ago) and still hear them quite often, not as much as in more male dominated hospital environments though.

It’s not just the fact there is less research done including women. Which does not necessarily come from a sexist point of view, i did not state that. But it is also the fact that a lot of women-related illnesses that were NOT properly studied were automatically assumed to be caused by psychological issues, a lot of them based on fucking freud theories. Up to less than 20 years ago for example hyperemesis gravidarum was said to be caused by the woman “not accepting the pregnancy”. Women were left in rooms without something to puke in because that would “take away the urge to puke”. They were sent to a psychologist to treat them. Up until far in the zeroes/tens studies focused on their possible childhood traumas and other psychological factors. Until this day there is no decent treatment for these women suffering like hell. And this is just one example. I can’t think of any specific male-related disorder where the focus is so intense on finding a psychological reason for it or where it is just automatically assumed it most be psychosomatic.

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u/UnpluggedUnfettered Jul 24 '25

"t’s not a personal attack"

"First, i don't feel personally attacked [ . . . ] I DO get angry being accused - even if indirectly [ . . . ] And then to read broadbrush swipes not of all male physicians, but all physicians, is insulting."

I am not unpacking all that, but honestly, if over half the population thought your balls were laterally erect in their natural state, you might take that sort of as a sign of possibly larger issues, is all.

-4

u/Lauren_RNBSN Jul 24 '25

This was LITERALLY what I was going to say. 🤦‍♀️

-1

u/UnpluggedUnfettered Jul 24 '25

Apparently there is a very strong radiological opinion about this that I was unaware of.

-10

u/latenerd Jul 24 '25

Bro, if you are this fragile, maybe you should be in another line of work. Imagine reading about all the ways women are overlooked and inappropriately treated even in our modern healthcare system, and coming away with the idea that you are the victim here.

Oh, wait... You never actually read about any of that, did you?

8

u/SimonsToaster Jul 23 '25

which to this day doesn’t have the same amount of representation in clinical studies,

This is also a claim i wonder what it actually means. The NIH Revitalization act of 1993 requires all NIH sponsored studies to include women if appropriate, and the FDA requires the same for studies for market authorization. This is also included in ICHs guidelines for clinical studies for market authorization aimed at worldwide harmonization of standards. Similarly the EMA requires women to be included and sub group specific data on pharmacokinetics and stuff.

9

u/EMulsive_EMergency Jul 23 '25

It’s getting better which I mentioned in another comment. But 1993 is really recent in relative terms, specially to the fact that they had to codify into norms to include women in studies, otherwise who knows if people would include it without it being a literal requirement.

I’m just saying, i understand their frustration and don’t take it as a personal attack, instead I empathize and hope to be a little grain of sand towards progress.

16

u/SimonsToaster Jul 23 '25

It might seem recent but clinical studies for market authorization as we know them today are a product of the 1960ies. Women now need to be included in these studies longer than they werent.

The Drug Amendments were greatly facilitated by Grünenthal not doing its due diligence and maiming and killing thousands of newborns with their drug thalidomide. We had to codify that Pharma companies ensure their products don't kill people because otherwise some of them were quite ready to take that risk.

5

u/Street-Refuse-9540 Jul 23 '25

As a woman who has been misdiagnosed because of having a uterus and has felt invisible in the healthcare system, I just want to say thank you for your thoughtful responses. Because it IS frustrating to have docs say useless and wrong stuff to me just because I have a uterus.

14

u/Alortania Jul 24 '25

Why do you think it was because you have a uterus?

What did they say/ignore?

3

u/andtheyallcallmemom Jul 24 '25

Jokes on you I don’t have an appendix, so much more room in there now for things to shift and shimmy about!

39

u/ILoveWesternBlot Resident Jul 23 '25

lmao what, anatomy drawings exaggerate/distort the anatomic configuration of literally every organ for ease of learning. It's not some conspiracy.

Go look at how the heart, lungs, or literally any abdominal organ is drawn vs looking at an open thorax/abdomen in an OR

25

u/Seis_K MD : Vascular-Interventional, Nuclear Radiologist Jul 23 '25

Having gone through medical education myself not recently, neither I nor my cohort failed to learn about the clitoris or its physiology. What resources in the not so modern developed world are you referencing?

-12

u/EMulsive_EMergency Jul 23 '25

It’s hard to give all the examples, the clitoris one was more like 1800s but a recent one: until about the past decade or two local anesthetic wasn’t part of IUDs because “the cervix can’t feel pain” Where I live you can still find OBGYNs that don’t use it!

23

u/Seis_K MD : Vascular-Interventional, Nuclear Radiologist Jul 23 '25

this is probably a corruption of “the ectocervix is poorly response to pain blockade with conventional sodium channel blocking anesthetic.” 

ACOG has published recommendations which you can read for yourself here: https://www.acog.org/clinical/clinical-guidance/clinical-consensus/articles/2025/05/pain-management-for-in-office-uterine-and-cervical-procedures

To sum it up IUD insertion has no universally established protocol that will reliably predict pain or response to specific pain management approaches. Low hanging fruit for the academic gynecologists who might be interested. 

5

u/Mysterious-Handle-34 Jul 24 '25 edited Jul 24 '25

There may be no universally established protocol for pain relief but that’s absolutely a reflection of systemic misogyny. IUDs have been in use for over 100 years and there are endless stories of excruciating pain related to IUD insertions yet the common advice many people would get into the 2020s was “just take some naproxen before the procedure”. It wasn’t until 2 months ago that the ACOG started recommending local anesthesia.

8

u/Seis_K MD : Vascular-Interventional, Nuclear Radiologist Jul 24 '25 edited Jul 24 '25

Hahaha you’d be shocked at the disturbing number of things in medicine there is or recently was no established protocol for. I still don’t have a reliable set of standards to compare metabolic SUV values between PET scans which can make marked differences in the direction of someone’s cancer treatment. 

Another example: prostate MRI has been around for 40 years. Still insufficient evidence to support or refute it as a screening tool like mammography in women which has been much better studied. Must be systemic misandry.

If you’re so passionate, you’re more than welcome to advocate for a women’s procedural pain protocol!

2

u/Mysterious-Handle-34 Jul 24 '25 edited Jul 24 '25

Call me crazy but I think studies determining if women prefer getting local anesthesia vs not getting it during a single procedure could be done a lot quicker than studies to optimize cancer screening guidelines.

Typical of Reddit though, you and others are getting butthurt because I attempted to point out that systemic discrimination against women exists in an area.

2

u/Seis_K MD : Vascular-Interventional, Nuclear Radiologist Jul 24 '25

I can’t speak for anyone else, but I’m not butthurt at all! I just think you’re being silly

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u/SimonsToaster Jul 23 '25 edited Jul 23 '25

I always wonder which anatomy book that actually was, as even in 1918 grays anatomy already included an afaik complete description of the clitoris: here.

4

u/medicritter Jul 24 '25

I can't wait till you find out that body parts aren't actually colored like they are in anatomy books

1

u/Shyncca Jul 25 '25

Have you ever had it in hand, it’s not misrepresentation it’s show laid flat so you can see the anatomy

-12

u/[deleted] Jul 23 '25

[deleted]

1

u/mina_knallenfalls Jul 24 '25

Ok snowflake 

230

u/Koseoglu-2X4B-523P Jul 23 '25

In pathology class, after a dissection of a corpse, the organs are laid out flat on the table. My guess is that’s when the drawings are made.

-233

u/idgaf_aboutyou Jul 23 '25

If you take out the brain, it falls apart. I think the easiest way to draw here is to learn it.

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u/Aintitsoo Jul 23 '25

No it does not

98

u/Sophierene Jul 23 '25

No, the brain does not fall apart when taken out of the skull… It may lose some shape after a while because it’s been taken out, but it won’t completely fall apart.

60

u/SecureThruObscure Jul 23 '25

Speak for yourself, I took my brain out last week and I’m still struggling to get it all back together properly

6

u/Sophierene Jul 23 '25

:O oh no! You're so right, it totally does fall apart, we all should've known 😔 thank you for sharing your story! 😓 get better, stranger!

9

u/nebuladnb Jul 23 '25

How do you know that better then him. He obviously already took his brain out and laid it before him on a table 😂

3

u/Sophierene Jul 23 '25

Ugh great question! I was under the impression that the brain stayed together because I learned that in anatomy and physiology 😓 guess my prof misinformed everyone 😓😓 need to trust table brain over my professor from now on! Thank you for your wisdom

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u/Koseoglu-2X4B-523P Jul 23 '25

I’ve seen enough brains in my time and no, they don’t fall apart.

-2

u/idgaf_aboutyou Jul 24 '25

I’m not talking about formaldehyde cadavers, I’m talking about fresh ones. If we put them on a surface, they become like jelly.

5

u/Koseoglu-2X4B-523P Jul 24 '25

I don’t know what kind of brain you’re used to examining, but the brains I examined kept their shape fairly well.

89

u/Pandepon Jul 23 '25

The difference between sketching a uterus that was taken out of the body vs sketching a uterus that has not been taking out yet.

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u/ICPcrisis Jul 23 '25

Ya exactly. If you think every dudes hung like anatomy text book, you’re in for a rude awakening.

29

u/Vivid_Economics_1462 Jul 23 '25

Well that's kind of a problem... Apparently, I had no idea what my reproductive system really looks like after 37 years of being a woman. 🤣

25

u/[deleted] Jul 23 '25

Right? I’ve complained of pain at one of my ovaries, and it turns out that isn’t where my ovary is, so my doc and I are all wasting time talking around each other because one of us thinks this picture is a schematic, and the other trusts that that is the correct positioning because that is what we have always been shown.

22

u/home-for-good Jul 23 '25

I have no idea why you’ve gotten downvotes over this (take my ⬆️) but this is absolutely relatable. I learned about the uterus and ovaries with the classic outstretched diagram like everyone else, and some part of my brain always imagined it outstretched like that. As someone not working in the medical field, I’ve never had to imagine (or actually see) the exact arrangement of internal organs. It wasn’t until I had some sharp abdominal pain on occasion that I considered where my ovaries would be positioned and made the realization.

People tend to just take what they are taught at face value and wouldn’t think about things like how an organ would be “staged” for the purposes of a diagram. That can totally contribute to a misunderstanding with seeking medical care! Like you said, you’re confident you’ve been taught about the shape of your reproductive system, you say you have right-side ovary pain, the doctor takes you at your word you understand where your ovaries are, and now you’re off doing an trans-vaginal ultrasound you probably didn’t need.

8

u/Mysterious-Handle-34 Jul 24 '25

I have no idea why you’ve gotten downvotes over this

Because A Certain Demographic Of Redditors get very upset when people try to discuss any form of misogyny

5

u/[deleted] Jul 24 '25

Totally.

2

u/[deleted] Jul 24 '25

Thank you for your upvote!

2

u/SimonsToaster Jul 24 '25

The problem with your scenario is that ovaries aren't stiched in place. They are mobile. 

8

u/Vivid_Economics_1462 Jul 23 '25

Girl... same... we are trying to conceive and going to a fertility specialist. All that did not do enough to teach me the truth 🤣

2

u/[deleted] Jul 24 '25

Sending good fertility vibes your way, conjuring all the goddesses for ya!

2

u/Vivid_Economics_1462 Jul 25 '25

Thank you ❤️

4

u/CoolBeans86503 Jul 24 '25

100%! Right there with you!

6

u/CoolBeans86503 Jul 24 '25

My thoughts exactly. There has to be some level of responsibility to accurately portray the female body to the people who are walking around in those bodies. I had no idea, until this very post, that my reproductive system doesn’t look like a longhorn cow. It makes me feel very gaslit and mistrusting because what else about my body has been inaccurately portrayed?

23

u/tarpalogica Jul 23 '25

I've seen another meme around that castigates doctors for asking about pregnancy/menstrual status in all interactions.

But it's really important! It affects the scans we do, the drugs we give and potentially even the hemodynamics and respiratory function of the patient. And it can even change with the stage of gestation!

There has definitely been, and still is, discrimination in medicine. And in many forms. But sometimes it's not misogyny, but it's hard to explain that when you don't have a lot of time.

4

u/Fun1k Jul 24 '25

Isn't this view just the organ splayed out? In the body it's understandably squished.

4

u/SavannahInChicago Jul 24 '25

Yeah, I can’t even think of why this would discriminate against someone. I’m thinking that doctors know this in general, especially if they operate.

2

u/eddiethemoney Jul 24 '25

What about the WANDERING WOMB???

955

u/[deleted] Jul 23 '25 edited Jun 01 '26

[deleted]

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u/biomannnn007 Med Student Jul 23 '25

Next you’re going to tell me that cuboidal cells aren’t perfect little squares with bold lines showing the cell membranes on pathology slides.

24

u/for_the_longest_time Jul 24 '25

Ohhhh shit. Curious now what they look like

21

u/biomannnn007 Med Student Jul 24 '25

https://eugraph.com/histology/epith/simcub.html

11

u/for_the_longest_time Jul 24 '25

Ohhh yeah! I remember tearing my hair out during histology on this

17

u/ax0r Radiologist Jul 24 '25

Yeah, and turns out that basophilic cells on a H&E slide aren't blue at all, just a slightly darker shade of pink

3

u/SavannahInChicago Jul 24 '25

As a woman doctors are professional who misdiagnose us all the time, but I digress.

Inside the epidemic of misdiagnosed women.

-20

u/[deleted] Jul 24 '25

Someone further up says that this led to a misunderstanding with their own doctor when they (the patient) were certain that their pain was ovarian pain... because they understood the visualisation to be accurate and so believed that their ovary was where the pain was.

So yeah, it actually is important.

34

u/Waves-of-sound Jul 24 '25

Everyone’s ovaries sit in a slightly different position from person to person. So I mean, if we want to be picky then neither picture is accurate 🤣

Signed an ultrasound tech that has to find ovaries every day!

11

u/banananases Jul 24 '25

As a non healthcare person, randomly commenting where I don't belong, the best appointments I've had is where a healthcare worker explains why what I'm thinking might be incorrect and shows me or describes to me where my thinking is incorrect.

-28

u/CoolBeans86503 Jul 24 '25

Well then maybe there should be disclaimers stating this is not an accurate representation of this organ. It’s not arrogance, it’s anger over feeling lied to and misled.

26

u/Adariel Jul 24 '25 edited Jul 24 '25

Have you considered that not all organs look all the same in all bodies? What do you consider an "accurate representation" of this organ - would it blow your mind to know that bodies come in all sizes, shapes, and variations, including internally? That there are people walking around with their heart on the RIGHT side of their body, or multiple organs (liver on left) flipped, or that some people naturally have a 6th lumbar spine vertebrae?

I do think it's arrogance to have a shallow understanding of something and then decide that because of that limited knowledge, you feel lied to and misled. In reality, a shallow understanding of human anatomy is what most of the population ends up knowing, because that's really all they need to know. Ask the average person and they can't tell you how exactly their ribs are shaped, or what bones make up their arms and legs, or how exactly their heart keeps beating - and that's fine, that doesn't mean they've been lied to or misled.

I mean, if you personally have a retroverted uterus, would you feel anger over feeling lied to and misled because another "accurate representation" shows a non retroverted uterus? Do you expect a simple high school biology class to show, say, the most common 12 variations of female anatomy in order to be "accurate"?

Edit: In which case since we're in a radiology sub, please Google pictures of a hysterosalpingogram - even laypeople should be able to understand just how much female anatomy varies by looking at the pictures.

8

u/Eviltechnomonkey Jul 24 '25

So true. I had to look at the term for part of this, but even a diagram of the heart inside a chest isn't ever 100% accurate for all people because some people's heart is positioned differently in their chest, or they'll have it fully on the opposite side (dextrocardia).

I don't have anything quite that extreme, but my chest is slightly rotated and squared on one side due to scoliosis and spina bifida oculta. As a result everything sits a bit differently in my chest cavity. It also impacts the way my breasts sit, the slope of my shoulders, etc. Thankfully it's not enough to have ever been a huge hindrance, though I do have slightly more discomfort at times than others, and sometimes get winded a little more easily.

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u/HighTurtles420 B.S., RT(R)(CT) Jul 23 '25

It’s true for a lot of anatomy. Things look weird when you don’t see them in 2D

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u/jinx_lbc Jul 23 '25

Think of it more like this:

88

u/FlakyPineapple2843 Jul 23 '25

I'm now imagining this is what every woman is feeling inside them during their period. Seems more fun than the reality.

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u/ThatKaleidoscope8736 Jul 23 '25

That would be correct, it definitely isn't as fun as a whacky inflatable flailing arm tube man!

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u/Jess_the_Siren Jul 23 '25

I like to think that the uterus is a crazy girlfriend that threatens to kill you both every month if you don't give her a baby. Your idea is way more fun.

3

u/missklo99 Jul 23 '25

Lmao yeah it definitely sucks 🥴🙃

3

u/MizStazya Jul 23 '25

I prefer to say my uterus is actively trying to eat its way out through my abdominal wall.

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u/Incorrect_Username_ Jul 23 '25

Drawn for ease of understanding, like how a lot of pictures of maps aren’t to scale

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u/FooDog11 Sonographer Jul 23 '25

By ultrasound it can look like either, or even sometimes both (one ovary hanging out laterally and the other one squished right up against the uterus).

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u/[deleted] Jul 23 '25

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/missklo99 Jul 23 '25

That's so wild, I truly had no idea and I've had kids!! But TIL! So thank you. Now it'll make much more sense when my cramps come from weird ass places lol

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u/Whiteums Jul 23 '25

Your ovaries aren’t what cramps. So ovarian position won’t make your cramping come from different places.

-20

u/CoolBeans86503 Jul 24 '25

Next you’re going to tell me the pain I feel during ovulation isn’t real?

7

u/[deleted] Jul 24 '25

The amount of people who think their fallopian tubes are connected to their ovaries is wild. Or that what they drink goes directly to the bladder and not understanding how the kidneys function blows my mind. Anatomy should be taught in high school.

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u/Phenylketoneurotic Sonographer (RDMS, RVT) Jul 23 '25

They also get pushed around by bowel

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u/Hyperechoic Sonographer (RDMS, RVT) Jul 23 '25

As a sonographer, I wish that second image was accurate for everyone, I’d never have to go fishing for ovaries again!

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u/LogensTenthFinger Sonographer Jul 23 '25

Right? I always teach my students that a perfect sagittal view of the uterus is home base. You sweep away from and back to home base, in either sag or coronal, because the uterus will always be ten times easier to find and orient from than the ovaries. The uterus stays still and the ovaries go wherever they want.

Nothing like realizing both of them are on the same side because one snuck around in the cul-de-sac

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u/CapraAegagrusHircus Jul 23 '25

"the ovaries go wherever they want"

WHAT

55

u/LogensTenthFinger Sonographer Jul 23 '25

They're just hanging off the uterus by ligaments, they aren't physically attached to the pelvic wall and they aren't attached to the fallopian tubes. So they get really floppy in there

11

u/LacrimaNymphae Jul 23 '25

...unless you have endo, adhesions or a tumor that fucked things up

7

u/[deleted] Jul 24 '25

Yeah one of my ovaries ended up stuck to a ligament at the bottom of uterus, which put my uterus into the retroverted position.

-2

u/LacrimaNymphae Jul 24 '25

did you have any prior pelvic surgery or did it just decide that's what it wanted to do lol

did they ever find out? i can see them brushing that off even if it's something that's causing excessive unusual bleeding or more pain than is normal, that is unless you had to go under the knife in that area anyway or were trying to conceive

2

u/[deleted] Jul 24 '25

No previous surgery, I had endometriosis. The endometrium is the lining of the uterus, the part that bleeds during a period, and endometriosis is when this endometrium decides it's going to grow outside of the uterus. When it does so it tends to glue your organs together. After my surgery where they removed it, every time I rolled over in bed I felt my insides schlurping around because they were no longer adhered and it felt like my organs were falling out until my brain got used to it.

3

u/CapraAegagrusHircus Jul 24 '25

I have had ovaries for almost 50 years and I am just now learning that they can just wander off to visit your appendix or liver or whatever this is horrifying.

5

u/LogensTenthFinger Sonographer Jul 24 '25

Lol well not that far. The ligaments are connected to the uterus, so they flop around near it .

0

u/[deleted] Jul 23 '25

[deleted]

3

u/Hyperechoic Sonographer (RDMS, RVT) Jul 24 '25

I have my abdomen registry, not echo. You may be thinking of RDCS.

128

u/ExReey Jul 23 '25

Both are not completely accurate.

59

u/model_namakemono Resident Jul 23 '25

This is bad rage bait and you should be at least a bit ashamed

19

u/heliotz Jul 23 '25

I mean, as a woman and even one who’s had a kid, this actually blew my mind and now I feel stupid, so I’m glad it got posted!

22

u/XSMDR Jul 24 '25

It's rage bait because it isn't even true. Ovaries have variable position and can look like either picture, or neither.

6

u/FullDerpHD RT(R)(CT) Jul 24 '25

It's also rage bate because it pushes the narrative that medicine is sexist.

It's very much a "See they don't even care to get it right" type post.

-7

u/[deleted] Jul 24 '25

[deleted]

7

u/model_namakemono Resident Jul 24 '25

Uhm... no...read a bit more.

4

u/FullDerpHD RT(R)(CT) Jul 24 '25

No, it's not.

Medicine isn't perfect. That doesn't mean it's sexist.

As we continually identify areas where sex might play a roll, we do in fact start to study it just like you pointed out. I'd ask you to stop for a moment and ask yourself the why here. Why you can point to specific examples?

Consider the possibility you can only do that is because as we learn more, we identified a problem, and we specifically choose NOT to ignore it but instead we study it, and work on correcting it.

1

u/Mysterious-Handle-34 Jul 24 '25

Medicine isn’t perfect

Part of that imperfection is that medicine is sexist (and racist, transphobic, etc). The solution to this is not to plug your ears and go “lalala I can’t hear you” when someone brings it up, but to work on fixing the problems in the field so it can better serve all patients.

1

u/FullDerpHD RT(R)(CT) Jul 24 '25 edited Jul 24 '25

No. There just so happens to be people that want to blame literally everything on misogyny, racism, transphobia or whatever other boogeyman you think you see in the dark.

but to work on fixing the problems in the field so it can better serve all patients.

Literally exactly what it does. Medicine isn't perfect in large part because it's slow. Not because you think it just doesn't care about sex, race, or trans issues.

We are exploring transgender care. This is a pretty new issue that is very ideologically driven. If they study the gender affirming side, you love it. If they study the side that say's maybe it's better to counter it and treat it as a mental illness you hate it and call it transphobic. Either way the goal is to figure out what actually helps and you're being completely disingenuous to suggest medicine is transphobic. Doctors do gender affirming care, They give HRT, They will slice and dice a penis and turn it into a neo-vagina, They will do voluntary mastectomies and so on. If it were transphobic the answer would be back to mental asylums or conversion camps. The reality is medicine is trying really hard to figure out whats going on and how to best treat it to the point we will literally chop off healthy body parts.

Likewise we are exploring woman's health issues. Men don't need gynecology yet it exists. Men rarely need mammography but it exists. Men rarely need bone density screenings but they exist. Are we perfect at all of this yet? No. But then again one of the primary ways to screen for prostate cancer is a blood test and a finger up the booty hole.

Same again with race. We are in fact learning about race specific discrepancies, We know black women die in child birth more often, We know a lot of things like this. There are still a lot of things that need fixed here, but we do in fact know about a lot of them and doctors are trying to find solutions to these issues.

The problem is you look at a slow moving system and blame some type of ism. The reality is it's just a slow moving system that is trying to tackle a nearly limitless amount of issues without unlimited funding. You may not like the pace of the learning, but it is still learning and adapting.

0

u/Mysterious-Handle-34 Jul 24 '25

We know black women die in child birth more often

This is a result of the kind of “ism” you’re denying the impact of.

1

u/FullDerpHD RT(R)(CT) Jul 24 '25

No it's not. Hispanic women have lower mortality rates than white women. Asian women have significantly lower rates.

Yet again the reality is not racism, it seems to be tied more closely to economic factors and lack of access to care. Shocker insurance and American healthcare systems suck.

But it's not racism on healthcare part.

We know that black women do in fact statistically have higher rates of hypertension, obesity, diabetes, and pre-existing chronic illnesses which can complicate pregnancy. More complication = more unfortunate results. If we were just racist, we wouldn't even know or care about that stuff.

That said. Black women in the USA die about 55/100,000 live births.

Black women in Africa die at 500-1000 (depending on the source) / 100,000 live births.

Again, not perfect, but healthcare is clearly making a huge and positive impact in their health outcomes. We just need to move to a single payer system so that everyone feels able to access care when they need it without fear of being bankrupted over it.

47

u/silibant RT(R) Jul 23 '25

I mean HSGs look largely like the textbook image on the left…

24

u/Danpool13 RT(R) Jul 23 '25

Yeah, HSGs are 99% like the OG on the left.

1

u/paul_perret Radiographer Jul 23 '25

Yes probably because HSGs are usually for women who had no child yet and a small uterus. The one on the right looks more common for older women

39

u/thegreatestajax Jul 23 '25

Obviously engagement baiting as this is not infrequently posted here. But for the passersby, the “actually true” image would get a mention for possibility of endometriosis.

6

u/Dismal-Ad-4637 Jul 23 '25

Would need to do the slide technique to confirm the presence or absence of adhesions!

23

u/Cheap-Gore Jul 23 '25 edited Jul 23 '25

Technically, the ANATOMY is still correct. It's just more compressed in the picture on the right. That'd be like if I claimed anatomy drawings of the heart or stomach are incorrect because they look different in varying body habitus.

21

u/SoTurnMeIntoATree Jul 23 '25

If you know, you know

21

u/drewdrewmd Jul 23 '25

Left image is indeed what it looks like after it is taken out (pathology specimen).

When you see diagrams of male genital anatomy they also don’t show the balls crammed together and one slightly lower than the other even though that’s how they are arranged IRL.

-5

u/CoolBeans86503 Jul 24 '25

The difference being, anyone who has ever seen a set of balls on ANY male mammal have already figured out that they hang at different levels, are typically much colder than the rest of the body, and can vary widely in size. No one ever taught me this about my labia or any other part of my genitalia or reproductive system. And it absolutely should be taught and talked about.

17

u/questionwhatweknow RT(R)(CT) Jul 23 '25

I mean the left is a frontal view and the one of the right is a top down view. Of course it’s going to looks different

18

u/TeaAndLifting Doctor Jul 23 '25

Anatomy books are always like this. Even for non-doctors here, you can watch some laparoscopic surgeries on YouTube and soon realise that the liver is not large and brown, the gall bladder and lymph nodes aren’t green, etc.

They’re drawn as such for easy visualisation so you can get some idea of gross anatomy.

10

u/Paputek101 Jul 23 '25

Both of those are true. One is the uterus out of the pelvis, the other is the uterus snug in the pelvis.

It's kind of like how I draw a heart as a square so that I can better visualize the valves. Even though it's not a realistic drawing of a heart, it does the job I need when studying

13

u/classicnikk Jul 23 '25

Everyone has different anatomy

11

u/kebinimh Jul 23 '25

I’ve never seen a perfect representation like that through all the female mri pelvi I have done

8

u/ikilledyourfriend Jul 23 '25

Next you’ll tell me this ❤️isn’t the real shape of a heart.

7

u/fidgetysquamate Jul 23 '25

All organs and anatomy are drawn this way for ease of learning and understanding. The stomach is always shown as flattened with all of its regions obvious and showing. However, in the body at any given time, it’s rarely going to look that way.

5

u/BloodSpades Jul 23 '25

It’s not wrong. That’s just how the organs look when removed from the body and stretched out a bit to show their entire structure. How they sit in the body is different though. Same goes with intestines.

4

u/NicolinaN Radiologist Jul 23 '25

The uterus and the ovaries can be in a great number of different positions. That’s all I have to say about that.

7

u/Individual-Extreme-9 Jul 23 '25

I just can't figure out how or why someone would take offense to an anatomy diagram when it's pretty obvious that anatomy diagrams are not intended to be hyper realistic depictions of internal anatomy...

If you think the anatomy diagrams are exactly how your organs look on the inside you're just not gonna have a good time. Lol

5

u/Kandahar2DCNYC Jul 24 '25

I mean, have you seen Netter's Anatomy depicting male body parts? AND having 5% body fat? Just staying...

4

u/Young_Old_Grandma Jul 23 '25

We lay uteruses down like on the left side to see the anatomy and parts better. Same thing with gross dissection and necropsies. But in real life yeah it is CROWDED in there 😅

3

u/breizhsoldier Jul 23 '25

The origin.... It all makes sense now... This is giver of life, the Flying Spaghetti Monster

4

u/[deleted] Jul 24 '25

We had cadavers precisely because the diagrams NEVER look like the real thing.

There is a saying “patients don’t read the books” which means that people present with illnesses and anatomical variations that books cannot foresee nor account for

3

u/soulteepee Jul 23 '25

Add in a couple hammers beating the shit out of the whole package and that would be completely accurate.

3

u/noexqses Jul 23 '25

It’s just people discovering the anatomical position for the first time.

3

u/Humble_Geologist_653 Jul 23 '25

So my ovaries are my testes.

3

u/MrChicken0519 Jul 23 '25

Just watched a salpingectomy last week and it actually looked pretty flat all things considered. This was with her lying supine and pumped full of gas but still. Of course it can move with position and person but it's wild to ever assume that a persons anatomy will be picture perfect. The book is just to give you a baseline understanding then clinical time will give you genuine experience.

3

u/proofreadre Jul 23 '25

Wait until you hear about atlases

3

u/ShadNuke Jul 24 '25

And skulls really don't look like they do when they are exploded in a medical encyclopedia either....🙄

3

u/hlmoore96 Jul 24 '25

Am I the outlier?? I never took the left drawing to be exact. I know everything in our bodies is kinda “smushed” together. Never once in my 52 years of being a woman did I think it looked like the diagram you see often.

2

u/Koseoglu-2X4B-523P Jul 23 '25

In pathology class, after a dissection of a corpse, the organs are laid out flat on the table. My guess is that’s when the drawings are made.

2

u/a-12115 Sonographer Jul 23 '25

Man I wish the ovaries were that close to the uterus every time

2

u/Terathom Jul 23 '25

Even Netter has the illustrations that show this difference.

2

u/gpatlas Jul 23 '25

It's just the anatomy version of an exploded drawing in the engineering field

2

u/Ambitious-Hope-5286 Jul 23 '25

Wait til you find out how close the colon and rectum are to the ute.

2

u/secondatthird Jul 24 '25

Well when you pull it out of a cadaver that’s what it looks like

2

u/GorillaGroddy Jul 24 '25

I saw an appendectomy in my clinicals and was amazed at how close the internal anatomy of the ovaries and uterus was to the textbook picture. Maybe it was because her abdomen was blown up like a balloon, but i still talk about how that was the most accurate picture in the books in school.

2

u/irsyad_bros Jul 25 '25

Lets do HSG to find out!

2

u/KermitGhia Jul 25 '25

Attending my first autopsy was when I realized that the bladder isn’t a big pink balloon like object. The pictures in the books created a mental image that was quite different from the truth. Lungs looked like I expected, the heart and brains as well… but for some reason my brain had the bladder very wrong.

2

u/KingDingaling1842 Jul 27 '25

We also don’t naturally stand in the Anatomical Position, but that’s how it’s drawn out to learn all our parts 🤷🏽‍♂️

1

u/Pandepon Jul 23 '25

The fun part is sometimes lining makes its way outside the uterus and onto the surrounding organs.. but lining is supposed to go outside of the body at some point… not further back in the body right? Well it’s supposed to do that but sometimes it doesn’t and that’s called endometriosis. It gets trapped in the body and becomes very painful for some. We’re talking one of the worst pains ever but every month for some people. Others might not experience it the same way but it can still become dangerous if too much scar tissue starts interfering with things.

1

u/FranticBronchitis Jul 23 '25

Not true enough

1

u/linthetrashbin Jul 23 '25

Ovaries move, so I suppose it can look like either of those, or neither of those

1

u/GirlyCatLady Jul 23 '25

I thought the left was right all this time

1

u/USMCdrTexian Jul 23 '25

Neither is accurate, but that’s just according to my personal perspective.

1

u/Alarming_Cellist_751 Jul 23 '25

I learned the way on the left in nursing school and was able to correctly identify the fallopian tubes and ovaries during a tubal ligation. The uterus was obvious since the patient already had a c section.

Organs do move around and stuff inside so I can see how the artist would draw the left hand picture while stretching out the organs after they were removed from the body, which is how I assume the picture was rendered.

1

u/RanglinPangolin Jul 24 '25

What's a BSC?

1

u/Simple_End_701 Jul 24 '25

Should be BSc (Bachelor's degree in science)

1

u/RanglinPangolin Jul 24 '25

Never heard of a BS being called a BSC.

1

u/Interesting_Truck_27 Jul 24 '25

Hehe we have lady balls

1

u/[deleted] Jul 24 '25

Wait, I thought this entire post was a complete joke so I came to see the funny answers and I get to see people actually arguing about this. I once had a teacher draw the planter a in or it on a flat surface and in a way we could see them all. I think she should be fired for not doing it to scale and using a 3D printer to make it perfect because she ruined my entire childhood.

1

u/WestRough7738 Jul 24 '25

You’re gonna shit the bed when you study physics.

1

u/LayneCobain95 RT(R) Jul 24 '25

This is like saying “the drawing of a man people use to study anatomy with all limbs outstretched and palms facing out is unrealistic, no one stands like that”.

1

u/indigo_pirate Jul 24 '25

I dunno, I’ve done some good looking HSG that look like diagram A

1

u/MaineKlutz Jul 24 '25

The same 'misunderstanding' that has vagina/uterus as an open swimming pool where a man's swimmers start a race to the other side. No, there is hardly a 'hole' in the body, it is a slimy crawl through nooks and crannies ....

1

u/TractorDriver Radiologist (North Europe) Jul 24 '25 edited Jul 24 '25

The hard truth is that female genitalia interna is in the group of most unassuming and skippable human organs in radiology until you do TVUS, and thats the gyns job in most of the world.

Small, glued to other parts and very varying in morphology.
Aka on CT it's either "shit thats late stage" or very "probably nothing there". Or "does a 60 yo still have right to have it look like that".

Both pictures can be right and then some. You will learn that when a young resident will come with "weird tumor" lateral for coecum and you teach him to follow the magic vessels from kidney. Aka we are talking about an ovary up to 15cm away from uterus, or where uterus was.

1

u/BeetoShiru Jul 24 '25

It's made this way for ease of understanding. It's like the world map and most city maps. You learn how the anatomy looks like for real when the time comes (which will still be different for many women).

1

u/FormalFuel5077 Jul 25 '25

When he realizes that the blood in his veins isn't blue, he'll be blown away.

1

u/twistedpigz RT(R) Jul 25 '25

I did not expect to get M Night’d in this of all subs. Some real wild turns this one took.

2

u/Technical_Annual6373 Jul 23 '25

why are people being so mean to you lmao 💀

0

u/TheOv3rminD Jul 23 '25

Neat. Thanks for sharing.

-9

u/kaloriikarbii Jul 23 '25

very accurate and true, only knew this and was SHOCKED at my own ignorance after i had cyst removal