Other Anatomy Sites

We’re all familiar with oral. rectal, axillary, ear and infrared thermometers but how often has anyone encountered thermometer placement in other body sites?

I’ve seen a few articles that advise women to take their basal temp in the vagina which is dumb advice since the vagina isn’t as closed as the rectum and doesn’t yield an accurate reading. It’s almost like sympathetic magic in that the woman wants a baby which comes out of the vagina so the supposedly logical place to stick the thermometer is in the vag. I also saw a soft core Italian comedy years ago where a pretty nurse stuck a thermometer in a young man’s groin.

How often? Checking my inguinal (groin) temperature happened to me almost every day when I was hospitalized for nearly a year with rheumatic chorea in the late 1950's. It was the safest and most convenient place to put the thermometer because of the tremors and unpredictable movements my body suffered.

I'm far from being an expert, but from what I've read, where (vaginal, rectal, etc.) the temperature is taken is immaterial as long as it is taken in the same place and time of day (preferably in the morning immediately after waking up) every time because basal (when core temp is at it's lowest during the day, usually upon waking) temperature rises only after ovulation, so does not predict it. Same time and place is critical for checking ovulation because the change will be in the range of ½ to 1 degree (F).

When a woman checks her temperature without assistance, checking in the vagina is, probably, much more convenient than rectally, and is just as accurate as checking temperature any place else. Because of proximity to ovaries, vaginal checks are probably the most precise (I don't know, but a gynecologist might) as long as the checks are the same time every day. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/2928151/

Taking inguinal (groin) temperature may, or may not, be a common medical practice today, but it is real one, and just as informative as taking oral, rectal, vaginal, or axilla temperatures. See link at end of paragraph just above this one.

Maybe we shouldn't be dismissive of what we see or read when we are only opining. 😊

When I was a young boy my family doctor always took a temperature reading from my groin. I would usually be sat on the dining table without trousers and briefs when he did this during home visits.

As part of my training as care assistant, We did 2 years child care. There we were taught to take temperature in groin, under the arm, rectal and oral.

This was in 1993/ 1994

I have also read, and been told during some medical training, that sometimes in ITU they use a urinary catheter which also has a temperature sensor built in, so they can get constant monitoring of temperature. I've also heard of this being used during “warming” following hypothermia. Obviously this is specialist equipment and not a method that would be used generally.

When I used to do First Aid at events, we used to have sensors you could put on the forehead; but we weren't overly confident on their accuracy; but they were useful if we didn't have out large event kit with the ear thermometer!

As I wrote in another discussion, for me, around the age of 6, my mom stopped taking my rectal temperature and started taking my groin temperature and continued to do so until I was 14-15. She allowed me to sit on the sofa, after taking off my pants and panties and, after putting the thermometer on me, she told me to cross my legs and stay like that for the time of the measurement.

For my sister, one year older than me, it was easier and less embarrassing, because she was wearing a skirt and my mom put the thermometer in her groin from underneath, taking off her panties, so that, during the measurement, the thermometer remained hidden under her skirt and my sister just looked like a little girl sitting with her legs crossed

I think in certain circumstances it can be be taken by the esophageal route. And it can also be determined by medical examiners/ coroners on deceadants via the liver.

I’m aware of vaginal, and armpit temps., but didn’t know that they can be done in the groin. A former girlfriend who was a nurse, told me that if a thermometer is rectal, then it shouldn’t be used orally, and vice-versa.. Since the anus is so close to the groin, and it’s likely that the groin isn’t the most accurate spot, then why not just put some Vaseline on it, stick it in the rectum, and be done with it?

In an ICU setting, a device called a Swan-Ganz catheter, used to monitor pressure in the pulmonary artery is sometimes used. It has a thermistor that provides a core temperature reading. Not for home use!

In an ICU setting, a device called a Swan-Ganz catheter, used to monitor pressure in the pulmonary artery is sometimes used. It has a thermistor that provides a core temperature reading. Not for home use!

My wife was being treated for severe vasospasms by pumping large volumes of fluids intravenously to dilate and help keep her arteries from constricting. She had a Swan-Ganz snaked through her heart to monitor volume expansion and hypertension. Essentially they could pump up a balloon to block a ventricle and check the pressure at various points in the heart (not exactly sure how it all worked but the SG catheter went through the heart chambers).

I don't recall them using it to monitor temperature.

JJM

I agree, but 5-6 years old, I hated the rectal temperature and always rebelled, so my mom started with groin measurement to keep her from screaming all the time. Then, when I grew up, I started the feeling with the rectal thermometer, but, in the meantime, I had developed the one with the thermometer in the groin first, because I had been taking the temperature like this for almost ten years. So I have two fetishes: rectal temperature and groin temperature.

It's not really done anymore but at one time, peeing on the thermometer was one method of getting the temp.

During an insurance physical at home about 15 years ago I had to give the nurse who did the physical, a urine sample in a container that contained a strip of some sort that registered the temperature of the urine. When I saw the reading on the strip, I had to announce it to her loudly from the bathroom ) and re-entering my bedroom as I handed it to her in the bag it went into. I asked then if that reading was accurate for a body temperature.

Reaching into her medical bag, she removed an electronic thermometer unit with a red probe on it, sheathed it, opened a foil packet of lube, dipping the now sheathed probe into it, lubricating it. She told me to lay on my stomach on the bed. I did. “

“I’ll bet you haven’t had your temperature taken this way in a while, huh? I’ll be taking it rectally, and it will be accurate!” She lifted my robe up over my hips, slid my briefs down behind my knees, had me spread my legs and as she parted my buttocks and slid the probe into my anus and further up my rectum, she quipped…”This is how I determine “accurate!”

The rest the physical was boring!