Abstract
This article was migrated. The article was marked as recommended. Objective: This study explored the perceptions of medical students and medical school staff towards tattoos. Background: As tattooing continues to become more of a mainstream practice, and with the lack of clarity provided by the General Medical Council on the topic, research to inform policy makers at a national and local level is merited. Methods: A case study was implemented to facilitate the exploration of the perceptions of tattoos. Focus groups and semi-structured interviews were used for students and staff respectively for data collection. The results underwent thematic analysis according to Braun and Clarke's guidance. Results: Medical students and medical school staff had broadly similar perceptions of tattoos. Four main themes were identified: the nature of tattoos, professionalism, freedom of expression and generational perceptions.
Highlights
Introduction and ContextReports show that tattoos may date back to the Neolithic era, approximately six to seven thousand years ago
Tattoos have the potential to produce a crack in this stereotype and it is stimulating to engage with other medical professionals to explore how they perceive a medical professional with a body modification of this nature
The initial questioning of both students and staff was performed to understand their overall perception of tattooed individuals
Summary
Introduction and ContextReports show that tattoos may date back to the Neolithic era, approximately six to seven thousand years ago. Tattoos have changed significantly with regards to their purpose. Where tattoos were once restricted to sailors, prostitutes and criminals (Thompson, 2015), a cultural shift has taken place in the last forty years, informally labelled the ‘tattoo renaissance’ (Mun et al, 2012:134). With this change in tattooing culture, it was deemed of interest to explore whether perceptions of tattoos within the medical profession has changed. For the purposes of this research, a tattoo will be defined as professionally performed and categorised under the modern subtype:. As tattooing continues to become more of a mainstream practice, and with the lack of clarity provided by the General Medical Council on the topic, research to inform policy makers at a national and local level is merited
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