Category Archives: Physician Coats

How To Remove Coffee Stains From Your Lab Coat

One of the most frequent ways to ruin your lab coat is that beverage you’re always drinking: coffee stains. Coffee is unavoidable if you work in medicine, and if you’re human, spills will happen.

If you have a cheap lab coat or one that is made of cotton or other natural fibers, unfortunately you probably can’t do too much except throw that lab coat away. That’s because natural fibers tend to absorb liquids really quickly and cling to the colors that created the stain.

If you’ve made the (smart and practical) decision to get yourself a high-quality lab coat made of performance fabrics, there’s a high probability you will be able to get that stain out! As a matter of fact, if you take a look at the reviews for this brand of white lab coats, you’ll see a lot of people have had no problem rinsing out coffee stains because of the durable, technological fabrics they use.

Here are the steps you should take to save your lab coat from a coffee stain:

  1. Rinse the stain immediately. Literally, as soon as you can get to a faucet, rinse the stain. Don’t bother with trying to spot clean. It’s not going to work.
  2. Apply a stain remover to the brown patch. The designers at Medelita have recommended OxyClean, but the most important thing is to take action as soon as you can. The sooner you apply the stain remover, the better chances you can salvage your coat!
  3. Launder as normal with NO BLEACH. The stain should have been released during the wash, and if you have a lab coat made of performance fabric then the bleach will wear down the fibers.
skirted back lab coat

Women’s Lab Coats: Straight Hem Or Curved Hem?

Looking at these two lab coats, it’s hard to decide which hemline I like better. These defining features are one of the things that make it worth it to spend a little extra on a designer lab coat, and it’s even better that there now exist many styles of lab coats for women so that you really can decide on a lab coat that better suits your personal style.

callia

As you can see, the Callia lab coat is infused with feminine elements – check out the slight curve in the hemline and the beautiful rounded collar. Simple, elegant, and flattering – but still professional!

Flattering Feminine Lab Coat

The Vera G. has a modern style and is still professional.

I’m also a big fan of the Vera G. lab coat, which is crisp and polished with straight lines and a modern cut. It’s equally flattering and stylish as the Callia, but with a slightly edgier look.

I give up – it’s impossible to decide which one I like better! At the end of the day, your choice of lab coat style should be one that reflects your own personal and professional style. Luckily, there are a lot of options for you to choose from as a woman in medicine.

Lab Coats for New Doctors

How Many Lab Coats Should A New Doctor Have?

Congratulations to all recent medical school graduates and new residents! Now that you have an MD behind your name, you get to ditch the short student coat and finally put on a sleek long(er) coat like the ones you see other MDs wear around the hospital.

You probably know to choose a lab coat that is high quality and made in a style that fits you well. It may seem superficial and frivolous, but it actually isn’t: sometimes perception is reality and the reality is that patients perceive doctors in white coats to be more competent than their peers without.

But how many lab coats should you have as a new doctor?

The answer to this question really depends on your access to a washing machine. Just for the sake of hygiene and sanitation, you’ll want to wash your lab coat after each wear. So if you are able to do laundry every day, you might be able to get by with one lab coat – but if you’re washing it every day there is a greater likelihood that the coat will start to experience some wear and tear pretty quick.

We recommend having at least 3-5 lab coats for this exact reason. That way if your favorite coat gets ripped or stained, or if you don’t have time to wash them after every shift, you still have a nice professional lab coat to get you through your next shift. Optimally a practicing doctor should have five lab coats, one for every day of the week, though as you continue your medical career you might find that your white coat wardrobe grows along with you!

Cute Lab Coat For Women

My Favorite Lab Coat For Female Physicians, Nurses, and PAs

There are many lab coats today for women in medicine – a big change from the scant options available 8 years ago. It’s great for female healthcare professionals to have the option to choose a professional white lab coat that is figure-flattering and shows off your personal style.

There are classic options for women in medicine who prefer the more traditional look of a lab coat – no frills, just a high quality professional white coat, but for women. However I personally prefer a more modern style: the Vera G. lab coat from Medelita.

Flattering Feminine Lab Coat

The Vera G. has a modern style and is still professional.

Named for the first female surgeon in Russia, Vera Gedroiz, the Vera G. lab coat is exceptionally flattering for women with a lean, athletic figure. It is a slim-cut lab coat; the slim fit is great because it skims over your body without being clingy, tight, or uncomfortable. It’s just incredibly flattering and gives you more confidence while making your rounds, consulting with patients, or even just interacting with your colleagues at an event or medical conference.

What I love most about the Vera G. is the sleek construction. It features a beautiful envelope collar, a super professional and modern looking detail which I’ve hardly found on a blazer or suit jacket, much less a medical lab coat.

Envelope Collar on Lab Coat

Envelope Collar on Lab Coat

Curved Seams Lab Coat Construction

Lab Coat Curves Make All The Difference

If you’ve tried on a Medelita lab coat, the first thing you probably noticed was the fabric, followed by the exemplary fit. Compared to these designer lab coats, the standard-issue cheap white coat feels practically like a preschool smock – you know, the ones they give to students before a messy finger painting session!

Why is the fit of these coats so remarkably different? Of course, there is a massive amount of time and care that goes into the design of every coat, but what makes these lab coats fit like a blazer or suit jacket rather than a typical lab coat is the fine construction – specifically the curved seams that allow proper fit and full range of movement.

This is just one of the many ways you can tell if your white lab coat is high quality. As any home seamstress can tell you, sewing straight seams is a piece of cake compared to sewing curved seams. Though the effort is well worth it when you reveal the finished product, creating a coat that fits well involves a lot of these curved seams, and that can be a painstakingly slow process.

The typical standard-issue lab coats that you’re probably used to are crafted with all straight seams. That’s why these frumpy white lab coats are so boxy and shapeless – they’re designed to fit a cardboard cutout, not an actual human who moves around while wearing their lab coat. The human body has curves, which is why Medelita deliberately takes the time and effort to design patterns that incorporate appropriately curved seams in the arms, shoulders, neck, and waistline of their lab coats.

It takes time and effort to build the perfect lab coat, but most of the clinicians who have tried a designer lab coat now feel they can never go back to the straight-seam standard.

The White Coat Effect

Invisibilia Podcast “The Secret Emotional Life of Clothes”

Podcasts are a great way to stay up to date on news stories and learn about things you never thought about before. They are ideal for listening to during a commute, or while doing tedious household chores. Listening to a podcast is the first thing I do every morning, as it wakes my brain up and stimulates thinking as soon as I wake up, preparing me better to take on the day.

One of my favorite podcasts is NPR’s Invisibilia, which tells stories “about the invisible forces that control human behavior – ideas, beliefs, assumptions and emotions.” These stories are often things you probably never even thought about before, and it prompts you to look at the world in a different way.

Recently, Invisibilia featured an episode entitled “The Secret Emotional Life Of Clothes”, which explores 7 different stories to examine how what we wear affects us more than we might think. The most poignant story, in my opinion, was their analysis of the theory of “enclothed cognition“, based upon a study in which participants were asked to complete a simple stroop test.

Some participants completed the test in their regular clothes, while others were asked to complete the test while wearing a white doctors coat. The study found that on average, participants wearing a white lab coat made fewer than half of the errors made by the other study group.

Interestingly, some participants were also asked to complete the test while wearing a white coat, but were told that it was a painter’s coat rather than a doctor’s coat. In these cases, participants also were not as accurate as those who believed they were wearing a white doctor’s coat.

This is an interesting exploration of how feeling like you are dressed professionally gives you more confidence and actually enables you to perform better intellectually. It is surprising that the simple act of putting on a white doctor’s lab coat would actually make you perform better on a test, but the proof is in the pudding.

Belted Lab Coats For Stylish Female Physicians

Say good-bye to frumpy, boxy, unisex lab coats made of 1-ply polyester. You’ve worked too hard, for too many years, to accept the subpar quality and fit of medical uniforms. Businesswomen get to wear fitted skirt suits or pants suits to work, yet medical professionals are forced to wear what is essentially, a glorified smock.

Instead, choose a lab coat that emphasizes your feminine shape. The Emma W. lab coat from Medelita was designed specifically for women working in the medical field. It features a shawl collar, which is very unique for a woman’s lab coat, but the best feature if the back belt that creates a graceful silhouette. The back belt on this lab coat is a visually pleasing detail that draws the eye to the waist, which is the narrowest part of your body.

Back Belt Lab Coat For Women

The back belt creates a graceful hourglass shape.

You might be thinking that an hourglass shape is not professional for the workplace, but in this case it is. The belt on this lab coat isn’t flashy or tacky or tasteless – it’s very refined, and the shaping is subtle, but oh-so-elegant. This is simply a lab coat that fits you well, because it was made to flow beautifully over the curves of real women, out there working every day, and give you the ability to do that work with confidence.

Lab Coat Germs

Do White Coats Really Spread Germs?

Over the last few years a debate has begun about the deficiencies of lab coats worn in doctors’ practices and clinical settings. Most criticisms have to do with the spread of germs and a lack of hygiene. On the surface, these claims seem to make sense – but dive a little deeper, and you’ll actually see that this threat is mostly bark with very little bite. As a matter of fact, with the proper care and worn in the right settings, the white coat is still very much an integral part of the patient care experience.

The white coat of today comes in performance fabrics that help doctors reduce the likelihood of spreading germs. Because the fact is, germs and bacteria are everywhere anyways – take off your white coat and you have bacteria on your arms and hands. There simply is no escaping all the bacteria, but there also hasn’t been any research that indicates doctors’ lab coats spread bacteria in cases of hospital-acquired infections.

Actually, in the UK health leaders started implementing a “bare below the elbows” policy for doctors with their lab coats. The intention was to prevent the spread of germs through the sleeves of the lab coat, which are the most likely to pick up bacteria throughout the work day. However, studies found that this measure didn’t have a significant effect on the reduction of hospital-acquired infection in patients.

As long as you launder your white coat regularly, there is very little evidence to indicate that lab coats are any more unhygienic than any other garment worn in a clinical setting. I would recommend that you wash your lab coat 3-5 times a week – not only will this reduce the amount of dirt and bacteria day-to-day, but keeping your lab coat fresh at all times is an easy way to prevent the buildup of these in the fabric as well.

Professional Doctor White Coat

What Does A Professional Doctor Look Like?

What is the image that comes to mind when you picture a modern professional?

Your answer will of course depend on what kind of occupation the person has, but there are a few things that are crucial for a professional image regardless of the type of work. For example, a professional businessman would probably wear a beautiful designer suit with impeccable details that fits him well. He would probably match it with a tasteful silk tie and high quality collared shirt. If it’s a businesswoman, she would likely wear a pants suit, or a skirt suit, or a modestly elegant dress.

Notice the key factors here: fits well, detailed construction, high quality garments.

This is no different in the medical industry! Like it or not, people judge a book by it’s cover every time they meet someone new. In the patient-physician relationship, your professional appearance can set the entire tone – are you wearing a shabby, ill-fitting lab coat? Your patient will notice, and they will subconsciously form an opinion of you that may not reflect your true level of professionalism.

As a doctor, it’s really important to keep in mind the image you are presenting to the outside world. Having a lab coat that fits like a tailored jacket is important, as is the quality of the fabric and construction. These details make a significant difference in making you look professional. After all, you worked hard for years to get that white coat – why not choose one that reflects your level of skill and sacrifice?

When Is A Lab Coat Like A Suit?

When the lab coat in question is the Medelita Classic Fit M3 Laennec coat. With designer details like notched lapels and meticulous seaming, the Laennec is a three-button lab coat (previously a four-button coat) with the distinguished fit of a suit.


laennec square

The Laennec is a classically designed lab coat that is truly reminiscent of a men’s blazer or suit jacket. The ergonomic tailoring through the shoulders allows for your full range of movement, while the moisture wicking M3 performance fabric keeps you cooler and drier than than any other lab coat fabrics. Fluid, stain, and fade-resistance ensures that your coat will stay a bright white color – for the perfect lab coat that blends style, comfort, and durability.

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Explore the Laennec Lab Coat and other men’s lab coat styles for a look that gives you a professional appearance befitting of your stature.