Why Lab Coats Turned White | Hacker News Reader

Why Lab Coats Turned White

asimov.press

82 pointsmailyk35 comments

When I worked in the NHS, our coats were far from white because we used to write on them, in magic marker, things like specimen numbers, doctors and nurses names, phone numbers etc. that we had to deal with queries about. I was always impressed that the laundry managed to get them pristine white again.

Of course this was just us sloppy men - female techs carried useful things like notebooks (paper) and biros.

And nowadays in the NHS you will be hard-pressed to spot a white coat - people wear ordinary clothes, scrubs, or nurses uniforms. At least that's my impression as a recent in-patient.

    > "our coats were white because we used to write on them"

It's hard to tell whether this is a deliberately trolling statement, a fantastical Walter Mitty style statement, or something else.

Coats weren't white for anyone to write on, and clinical staff didn't routinely write on their clothes.

> Coats weren't white for anyone to write on, and clinical staff didn't routinely write on their clothes.

I wasn't a medic, I was a microbiologist. And I can assure you we did write all over them.

    > "I can assure you we did write all over them"

You and your colleagues deliberately chose to carry a magic-marker (and no paper), in order to deliberately write on your clothes, rather than the more simple expedient of paper and pen/pencil?

This seems irrational, inexpedient, and inappropriate for anyone delivering any aspect of medical care.

Yes, we did all that - we had to carry markers to label culture media in containers such as petri dishes and universal containers. You can easily misplace a notepad, but its hard to lose your labcoat.

I did say we were sloppy.

We were not in contact with any patients and at least in the UK, no-one that is ever wears a white coat these days.

I find it somewhat offensive that I am lying and/or unprofessional about this.

    > I find it somewhat offensive that I am lying and/or unprofessional about this.

It's an extraordinary claim, which usually would require extraordinary proof. I've also worked in UK healthcare, albeit in a patient-facing role rather than a back-office or technician role.

The whole process would raise so many questions.

    > "You can easily misplace a notepad, but its hard to lose your labcoat"

Surely if notes were taken on a labcoat, these would then have to be copied into a more permanent form? As you've said, the coats are washed, which makes the coat a very short-term data-storage device.

I have a whole bunch of white t-shirts, and wear a white t-shirt pretty much every day. It's never once occurred to me to write an appointment-time, a phone number, or a shopping-list on my t-shirt.

I think it makes sense, notebooks are hard to sterilize.

    > notebooks are hard to sterilize

Washing / sterilizing the lab coat has the same effect as erasing the data written on it.

There isn't a library of lab coats which contain notes written on them, for future consultation.

A notepad page is also easier to permanently sterilize (via incineration) than a lab coat.

The labcoat is a kind of L1 data cache.

The commenter acknowledges this: "I was always impressed that the laundry managed to get them pristine white again."

I think it's pretty clear they were taking ephemeral notes, not using them for long-term archiving.

I don’t find it hard to believe. I’ve written tons of notes on my arms and hands when working product support. When I briefly framed houses we would do all our math and diagramming on lumber. Either studs in the wall or scraps from the floor. You write on whatever you have handy.

NB: The original post said:

    > "our coats were were from white"

Which appeared to be a typo.

The understanding of the original post was "our coats were white because", which implied the purpose of the coats being white, was to allow them to be written on.

The post was edited to read:

    > "our coats were far from white"

Which has a very different meaning. Still questionable, but changes the context from "it was expected that we would write on our clothes", to "we wrote on our clothes".

Did you write on them because a notebook could cross contaminate while the coats are sterilized safely? Did you wash the markers?

I wonder how people handle this now? With IP68 tablets, you can probably just dunk the whole thing in alcohol.

(Also thanks for sharing such an interesting anecdote)

No, after a couple of days (or even halfway through a day) our lab coats were about as contaminated as could be!

I agree with you about the use of tablets in hospitals though. I don't think I ever saw one being sterilised las time I was in hospital for a bit.

> And nowadays in the NHS you will be hard-pressed to spot a white coat - people wear ordinary clothes, scrubs, or nurses uniforms. At least that's my impression as a recent in-patient.

Yeah, they were banned in the name of hygiene (sleeve length) not that long ago. 2007 in England & 2014 in Scotland I think.

The BMA has some lingering objection to it from what I understand, but since Covid they're all in scrubs anyway. If they want prestige and distinction from nurses/PAs it would probably make more sense to do differently coloured scrubs, as they do in some US TV shows (but not all; no idea about reality).

They do this at my local hospital at least. There is a plethora of colours for different staff roles. I understand this is not consistent across the whole NHS but in general the principle is mostly followed. eg, see

  https://www.workwearexpress.com/blog/NHS%20Uniform%20Colour%20Codes

I didn’t see maroon on there for anesthesiologists.

Oh, interesting. The few hospitals I've been familiar with through my wife's working there have all been single colour (or slightly different shades with different ages of stock!).

I don't think there's a rule about it though, it's just what they stock & launder. I don't think they're mandatory for doctors at all – my understanding is they pushed to be allowed to wear them during the pandemic, at least at the hospital she was at at the time, and it just stuck, 'nobody' wanted to go back to 'professional clothes' and washing them at home, and it'd be hard to enforce once you've dropped it I imagine.

Edit: see this doc (2024), seems it's being standardised nationally, and there's nothing for doctors at all: https://azuksappnpdsa01.blob.core.windows.net/datashare/NHS-...

(So what they'll do in practice, no pun intended, when the trust moves to this system I have no idea... Keep using the old ones washing them at home? Buy Figs etc.? Stop wearing scrubs?)

> as they do in some US TV shows

It depends on the hospital and it might also be regional.

At the hospital I go to in California, green is for surgery and everyone else seems to be in a free for all. I know they reserve dark red for visiting specialists, but the doctors and nurses both wear whatever they want.

> Of course this was just us sloppy men - female techs…

What an odd thing to say

The writer is retired and probably in his 70s now, so keep that in mind

I assume you're referring to the HN user zabzonk, rather than the article author Donna Vatnick.

The HN user zabzonk's profile description says "Ex C++ programmer and project manager".

It'd be interesting to understand more about their crossover from microbiology into C++ (or vice-versa).

Well, as you ask, I got fed up with dealing with human excrement, urine, blood, pus from wounds etc. I was developing an interest in computing using things like the TRS80, and so decided to switch over. The two (microbiology and microcomputers) had nothing in common. I quickly started using & programming things like DEC VAX & DecSystem10, IBM VM/CMS, Unix in various forms and so on. Now (at 72 years old) I'm retired, but do like to keep my hand in a little.

My observation about female technicians was in no way meant to be derogatory - I had several female managers who I liked very much, and I've always admired female tech's aseptic technique, and other techniques compared with mine.

I think it's more that it's implicitly derogatory to other men. People get annoyed when you speak for them, sort of deal.

I'm a male, I don't write notes on my clothing, and I found the whole comment hilarious

It's possible some folks have thin skin.

As a lab worker, what the hell? Post-its perhaps?

In modern times, as I understand it, there has been a complex trade-off.

The environmental impact of that laundry problem has been reduced but at the cost of 3M Corporation producing trillions of post-it notes that carry such tidbits of information around labs instead.

At one point, I worked in the labs division of a big internet company, where I was a regular software developer surrounded by people with the title "scientist" (basically, programmer/statisticians with PhDs who were running engagement and revenue experiments on our user base).

In the first group meeting I attended, I jokingly asked why no one was wearing a white coat, but my colleagues didn't get the reference, so my joke fell down with a thud.

I'm sure the article is broadly correct but in 3 separate academic institutions I've worked for in labs the assigned/monogrammed PPE coats were light blue, light red, and dark blue. Likewise my father in law's corporate research lab coats i've received as castoff gifts have all been light blue or dark blue

So they can see spills easily

"It's just you've got mustard on your... right there, on the..."

> The real driver of white lab coats was the hygienist movement.

This is a really compelling read with several historical sources, with a title that can be answered in a single sentence buried deep in the article. I'm a little sad to see such quality writing with a title that could be mistaken for a slop blog post.

Well, you need a hook to get readers to start reading.

And it is an interesting article well worth the time spent reading it, so no harm done.

Never thought about this. The kind of question that sounds trivial until you actually try to answer it

Because of chalk?

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