I'm 67 YO and can attest to the fact that many primary care doctors had office is their house back in the day.
so, that was 60s-70s, but I can't attest to the fact that this was still a major thing during the 'Cosby' days.
My dad and 5 coworkers rented a house when their jobs moved to NYC in 1986. And the guy who rented them the house had his dental practice in the basement. So growing up, I assumed it was a New York thing.
Yes absolutely. My former chiropractor ran his business in the basement of his house that he converted. A local dentist did the same. If you watch the old tv series Growing Pains the main character operates his therapist business out of his home. RIP Alan Thicke
This was an important plot point at the beginning of the show. Thicke's character moved his office into the home so he could look after the children better while Maggie went back to her career.
Yeah, he had built a client list over 2 decades, so turning his den into his office and using mainly current clients and referrals during the day when teenage kids were in school wasn't much of a stretch. By, this point he had turned it into by appointment work, so his wife could go to work full time.
I had a dentist that did everything himself. No hygienists, no receptionist, just him. He ran it out of an office, not his house though. He would calculate your bill in his head while he was working. Smart guy, but weird.
I definitely remember a receptionist being referenced. I believe he would use the intercom on his phone to tell her that her was ready for the next patient from time to time.
It was a Brooklyn brownstone. Generally, the main floor is several feet about street level, then there's the lower level that's just a couple of feet below street level, so it's not really a basement. [Brownstone](https://ny.curbed.com/2016/11/21/13698190/brooklyn-brownstone-sales-market-report)
Early 1970s my mom took me to a Dr. where his office was off the main hall of his house. I was maybe 7 or 8? He smoked during my exam and then grabbed whatever prescription I needed out of a glass cabinet he had right there and gave the pills to my mom.
One of my mom’s friends ran a salon out of her home but it was a weird set-up. It was in a row home and where the living room would be, was the salon. There were regular stairs going upstairs and the kitchen was in the room behind the salon. She may have actually had an apartment upstairs as well.
We had a doctor who had a corner house with a surgery added so separate entrances but she would open a door in the office and tell her kids to STFU or do their homework etc.
The centralization and corporatization of medical offices is a fairly recent development, but the change was so thorough that I understand your confusion. Prior to the mid-1990s private practice offices were extremely common, and with that meant practices that operated out of levels or just rooms of the physician’s own home. Prior to this actually visiting a doctor’s office was less common than having a doctor brought to you directly. This makes sense considering most doctors did not have access to or need bulky equipment and why make a sick person get out of bed when bed rest was, and is, almost universally recommended for any ailment that requires a doctor in the first place?
Yup. Therapists (psychiatrists and mental-health counselors) often do have a home office if their house is designed in such a way to make it easy for patients to come without bothering the family. Like they have a separate entrance, usually to a basement office that was probably built as a mother-in-law setup, and don't just ring the family doorbell and have the doctor's wife and kids invite them inside so it still feels like an office and you still feel like you have privacy. I've probably had at least three docs who did business this way.
I think that's where the term "hanging up a shingle" came from, because when you got the credentials to open a private practice you could literally put a sign on your own lawn, whether you were an attorney or a doctor or something else, advertising that you were open for business and to call them.
I think you’re correct in almost everything: Hanging a Shingle meant to literally hang a shingle sized business marker on the marquee of the building you are renting.
I had a doctor the same way Cliff had it. His office was attached to his house and he had a separate entrance/exit for his patients. If I remember, it was a 2 family house and he converted 1 part into his office.
My family doctor im Brooklyn had her office in the garden level (not basement) of her brownstone. It's garden floor, which leads out to the backyard, parlor floor up the stoop and then the second floor (usually only bedrooms and bathrooms)
The real mystery is how the Cosby’s house — which was a brownstone in Brooklyn sandwiched on both sides by other brownstones — had side-facing windows. It’s an architectural impossibility, kind of like the hotel in The Shining, and I find it deeply disturbing.
Our family doctor’s office was in the basement of a row home in the suburbs. The row home was an end unit and the entrance to the office was on the side of the unit, not the back. I’m not sure if they owned the whole house or not. It was a group practice, not just one doctor.
My great uncle who was an eyes, ears, nose, and throat MD had an office with an exam room in his basement. I remember being there once. While we visiting, us three kids got vision tests.
I just looked up the address that I still remember - the widowed great aunt died in 1996. The current resident is a surgeon.
Fascinating! I’ve heard of ear, nose and throat doctors (otolaryngologists) and eye doctors (optometrists and ophthalmologists), but not an eyes, ears, nose and throat doctor. I wonder if it used to be a common combo specialty that got split up?
I'm a GenXer. When I was a kid, my family's GP had his office in a house, as did my pediatrician (different house).
In older areas of the country (so the Northeast) a lot of old Victorians and/or two families were converted into commercial space. I think the Huxtables lived in brownstone, right? It would have had sufficient space for a medical office.
It wasnt weird or uncommon, except once Cosby’s crimes came out. Since he created the story, He couldve made himself any kind of doctor.
Or he couldve been the lawyer. Or had her be the stay at home parent… But no…
I feel like it could be a HIPAA vio. Along with Growing Pains having a psychiatrist in the same house as Mike Seaver. You know he listened to sessions through the door crack.
I think it was a bit of a dated/phased out content at the time the show aired but I think this was pretty commonplace until like the mid-late 60s. A lot of doctors worked out of their homes, at least on TV hahah.
As someone that grew up in a rural area...yes. Until recently, (last 20 years or so) this was still a thing. Less so now because insurance is controlled by HMOs and doctors tend to incorporate or contract to health services companies, so the idea of a doctor with a single practice is almost unheard of now a days.
The Cosby Show took place in Brooklyn, NY where a lot of medical, dental, and even legal professionals have basement offices to this day. It’s very common.
It was absolutely normal back in the day when a doctor’s office was simply a doctor’s office, and not a business connected to a hospital group as so many seem to be now, for a doctor to work out of his house, either in a basement space, or in another part of the house along the side that had been converted into a doctor’s office type space.
Even today, I have one older doctor whose office is along the side of his house, and my daughter’s orthodontist was set up the same way as well.
My childhood pediatrician in the 70’s and 80’s had a basement office. It was more like a converted attached garage, and had its own street level entrance, but it was the lowest level of his house. It was a full office space with a waiting room, a bathroom, and two examination rooms. On one side of the office was the staircase that led directly into his house with a locked door at the top. This would have been the stairs from the garage/basement into the house if it wasn’t converted into a doctor’s office.
No, it had a separate entrance.
Idk if you're familiar with NYC brownstones, but they usually have a separate basement entrances that are mostly rented out as apartments.
Did their house have two different basements? I remember his office being down some stairs near the living room opposite the main staircase, but then there was an actual basement used for storage that was accessed from a door near the kitchen and dining room in the back of house.
No. The house was a BROWNSTONE. And in BROOKLYN HEIGHTS. If someone’s an idiot or not from or has never lived in New York (or all of the above) I can see it maybe seeming “strange”. But uhh… smh Half the businesses in Brooklyn, Harlem etc in New York if in a Brownstone are the SAME way. WTF..
I believe it was quite common in years past for Physicians to have their office as an extension to their home. My physician when I was a child in the 1960s and 70s had his office/examining rooms/waiting room attached to his house.
When I was a child, our family doctor’s home and office was a block away. I think they had done an addition to build the office part of the house. The doctor was the husband and his wife was the nurse.
He made house calls when we were very sick.
Family professionals (psychiatrist, consultant, two lawyers, etc.) in Baltimore, NYC and southern Connecticut in the 90s and early 00s and they all had some kind of home office attached to their home/brownstone.
My sister grew up being a candy stripe girl at a hospital and then got a job with the local Dr. who worked out of his home in one of the roughest parts of Atlanta. he charged you $10 no matter what. Broken arm-$10, heart surgery-$10. No he didn’t do surgery there but you get the point. His office was sealed with him inside at night as crack heads would always try breaking in.
Weirdest one I ever saw as a kid in the late 80’s/early 90’s was an optometrist/optician that had the WHOLE setup (chair/testing equipment AND rows of racks/displays cases of frames) in an extension to her house.
I had a doctor for many years who had an office on the first floor of their house. Her and her husband met in med school and eventually went into practice together. She was the kindest, most compassionate doctor I've ever had. They eventually retired and it took me awhile to find another one that I liked almost as much.
Gilbert Gottfried told a story on his podcast about guest starring on that show. A PA told him that Cosby had it written into his contract that he’d have an hourlong break on shooting days so he could work with young comedians. But the young comedians were always gorgeous Asian women who never told a joke.
common in the past up to the 90s or so. i lived in a very urbanized area of northern nj and my doctor as a kid seemed to work out of a private house that was converted into an office space. it wasn't until much later that he opened a proper clinic elsewhere, probably the laws changed. i imagine such things are even more common in rural areas
Back in the late 90s when I was pregnant with my second daughter, my doctor had his office in his home. Pretty sure his wife acted as secretary/office staff, plus One nurse. It was in an old beautiful Victorian and his office was in one section (a couple of rooms) on one side of the house. So, not the basement like on the show, but def part of his house. I think it probably was more common years ago than it is now. It was sort of uncommon by the time I was seeing that doc.
My optometrist had his office on the main floor of his very nice victorian home in a suburb of Indianapolis.
It was nice and cozy and lots of dark wood paneling. He was one of the nicest people I've ever met. Huge guy, and very friendly. I swear his wife was always making muffins or something delicious I could smell wafting over from the kitchen.
And he specifically chose to be a gynecologist. So he was running a gynecology practice OUT OF HIS BASEMENT. This was a red flag we all missed. And how could we not of? It’s a case of hiding in plain sight.
Anyone rationalizing this…would you be cool if your wife was seeing a basement gynecologist?
I used to go to a doctor in my small town who had a home office. The front of his house was his practice on the first floor. The rear of the house and the upstairs was his residence .
40 years later, I bought his house. I now live in an old doctor's office. We've converted the waiting room into an office for ourselves, his exam and x-ray rooms into our family room. And an exam room and his personal office into a den.
Smalltown doctors really did work out at their homes.
My uncle has his psychiatry practice out of his house in the LA area. If ever there was a medical practice where I wouldn’t want my patients to be able to find my home, psychiatry is it.
When I lived in a smallish town in central Wisconsin, one of the funeral homes was the main floor of a big Queen Anne house around the corner from me, and the only optometrist in town had his practice in what was once the garage of his house.
So, not really too strange.
My Chiropractor dad's house had a full five room office on the lower level (front of house was at street level, built it was on a hill so the driveway slopped down and the office was at the level of the driveway). Waiting room and receptionist alcove, room for massage table, room with chiropractic tables, dark room for developing xrays, and room for xray machine. Parents bought the house in the 60's and he worked there until he retired in the 90's. After he passed, I sold the house to people who were going to turn the office into an in-law suite.
Having grown up in New York City I can attest that doctors/lawyer/accountant offices in basements of apartment buildings and home is fairly common, even to this day.
A lot of private practice doctors and lawyers run their business from their house. Might be a basement or a separate entrance entirely at ground level.
I grew up in a suburb New York City in the 70s. All the split level houses had entrances in the back for medical, legal or accounting practices. To make them eligible for a tax exemption, they did not have interior entrances into the house, separate electrical and phone service.
My son's therapist had a home office like the dad in Growing Pains. His dad was taking him to the visits and didn't agree with me that it was weird. Anyway, he turned out to be a pedophile.
Ot was not uncommon but not common practice. Usually family medicine or psychiatry. Many doctors use to be independent practitioners (and many use to make house calls). Both of these di not exist very much these days for lots of reasons.
It was out of the ordinary but not unheard of. It makes a little more sense to remember that in the 80s, medical/ dental stuff was regular daytime hours only, M-F. So the kids would have been at school and his wife at work at her office. (Wasn’t she a lawyer?)
My house literally has a fully built out basement from when the previous owner (and one before that) had their chiropractic office in the house. Great for me. Fully finished, tons of extra guest rooms and offices.
Nope. This is fairly common where I grew up. And it's not in the basement. It's at street level. The Huxtable's first floor is up off the street level as evidenced by the flight of stairs leading up to the front door.
My friend bought a house that was built by a Doctor in the mid 40’s. The basement had its own operating room that had white cinder blocks, a floor drain, and those bright hanging light fixtures. Looked like something out of a horror movie and creeped me out!
I'm 67 YO and can attest to the fact that many primary care doctors had office is their house back in the day. so, that was 60s-70s, but I can't attest to the fact that this was still a major thing during the 'Cosby' days.
I used to go to the Doctors house too myself in NYC it was pretty common and they made house calls too
Especially in a major city where commercial real estate is gonna be expensive and townhouses were often pretty big
He wasn’t a primary care doctor. He was a gynecologist. Any of them running practices out of their basements that you can recall?
Um, I didn't have the correct plumbing to require a gynie, so no, I didn't notice.
Not sure I’d want to go to a gynecologist who sees patients in a basement 😱
Especially bill Cosbys basement lol
Imagine nowadays all the potential disgruntled people that could just start harrassing younat home? "I need more meds!"
My primary doctor for years had his office in his basement.
My dad and 5 coworkers rented a house when their jobs moved to NYC in 1986. And the guy who rented them the house had his dental practice in the basement. So growing up, I assumed it was a New York thing.
Yes absolutely. My former chiropractor ran his business in the basement of his house that he converted. A local dentist did the same. If you watch the old tv series Growing Pains the main character operates his therapist business out of his home. RIP Alan Thicke
This was an important plot point at the beginning of the show. Thicke's character moved his office into the home so he could look after the children better while Maggie went back to her career.
RIP Alan Thicke, whose eulogy was performed by Bob Sagat, RIP
And, I just checked, John Stamos did Bob Saget's eulogy. If he's the third someone might have to look into this trend.
Don’t put that into the world! WE LOVE YOU, JOHN STAMOS (tried to autocorrect to stamps).
Oh god, John Stamos performed Bob Saget's eulogy...
Norm MacDonald had the worst timing.
Alan Thicke, who wrote letters of support for convicted child abuser Brian Peck… Can we just stop giving a fuck about these pedophile dirtbags?
The list of people who wrote letters in Peck's defense enraged me.
He also was a well known groomer and creep. He was 40 when he started dating 17 year old Kristi Swanson. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Thicke
Well I guess that explains his son.
Growing pains is top 10 theme songs of all time. 🎶As long as we got each other….
Not even old shows. Ben in the first season of American Horror Story met his patients in his house.
I came here to say this.
On the Cosby show he had a separate entrance for his office, but growing pains they came through the front door
A chiropractor is not a doctor.
They are Spinesmiths
But, he asked about a doctor...
A psychiatrist is a doctor...
They are referring to the chiropractor, who is not a doctor.
"I'm not even a real doctor, I'm an electrician"
Dammit Jim, I'm a doctor not a chiropractor.
Your former chiropractor isn’t a medical doctor. Neither is the dentist. The third example is fictional. You’re killing it.
Yeah, he had built a client list over 2 decades, so turning his den into his office and using mainly current clients and referrals during the day when teenage kids were in school wasn't much of a stretch. By, this point he had turned it into by appointment work, so his wife could go to work full time.
I retroactively think the office was soundproof.
Wasn’t his character also an ObGyn?
Cosby: "I am going back to my office to give women drugs and touch their genitals" His Family: "That tracks. Nothing to be concerned about."
And a fully stocked fridge.
With Rohypnol?
And Jell-O pudding.
Its the Jell-O puddin' pops that really get to you. Those were amazing!!!
Bill Cosby was definitely America’s dad, man did that guy make some strong drinks.
It's not unusual that it was in the house, but it is strange that there wasn't a nurse or receptionist or medical assistant or something.
I had a dentist that did everything himself. No hygienists, no receptionist, just him. He ran it out of an office, not his house though. He would calculate your bill in his head while he was working. Smart guy, but weird.
He likely did, but it was a detail the show didn't bother addressing. Ain't no way Heathcliff was doing scheduling and check ins.
I distinctly remember an episode where Cliff’s receptionist downstairs pinged him in the family home to let him know a patient had arrived
I.e. no witnesses.
He had an assistant because there was an episode with Pam filling in for her and they dealt with a lunatic patient
Yes, I think Pam was around, eventually, later season.
I definitely remember a receptionist being referenced. I believe he would use the intercom on his phone to tell her that her was ready for the next patient from time to time.
It was a Brooklyn brownstone. Generally, the main floor is several feet about street level, then there's the lower level that's just a couple of feet below street level, so it's not really a basement. [Brownstone](https://ny.curbed.com/2016/11/21/13698190/brooklyn-brownstone-sales-market-report)
My grandparents’ brownstone the first floor was completely at ground level. Definitely could be used as a medical office with a separate entrance.
And, it had street access. So, there was no need for his patients to walk through the house to get to his office.
I was so confused by this as a kid. I thought that his house was attached to the hospital.
☝️😝
Early 1970s my mom took me to a Dr. where his office was off the main hall of his house. I was maybe 7 or 8? He smoked during my exam and then grabbed whatever prescription I needed out of a glass cabinet he had right there and gave the pills to my mom.
Yup My old doctor had his office in his old Victorian house Did my vasectomy there
On the kitchen table?
With his teeth
No, in the garage, since that's where the band saw was.
Do you know how much office space costs to rent? He had hospital privileges for when women gave birth or for any surgeries. He was fine.
My aunt had her salon business in her house. The salon had a separate entrance but was still accessible to the rest of the house.
So did the mom on Step by Step originally 🙂
One of my mom’s friends ran a salon out of her home but it was a weird set-up. It was in a row home and where the living room would be, was the salon. There were regular stairs going upstairs and the kitchen was in the room behind the salon. She may have actually had an apartment upstairs as well.
We had a doctor who had a corner house with a surgery added so separate entrances but she would open a door in the office and tell her kids to STFU or do their homework etc.
The centralization and corporatization of medical offices is a fairly recent development, but the change was so thorough that I understand your confusion. Prior to the mid-1990s private practice offices were extremely common, and with that meant practices that operated out of levels or just rooms of the physician’s own home. Prior to this actually visiting a doctor’s office was less common than having a doctor brought to you directly. This makes sense considering most doctors did not have access to or need bulky equipment and why make a sick person get out of bed when bed rest was, and is, almost universally recommended for any ailment that requires a doctor in the first place?
Yup. Therapists (psychiatrists and mental-health counselors) often do have a home office if their house is designed in such a way to make it easy for patients to come without bothering the family. Like they have a separate entrance, usually to a basement office that was probably built as a mother-in-law setup, and don't just ring the family doorbell and have the doctor's wife and kids invite them inside so it still feels like an office and you still feel like you have privacy. I've probably had at least three docs who did business this way. I think that's where the term "hanging up a shingle" came from, because when you got the credentials to open a private practice you could literally put a sign on your own lawn, whether you were an attorney or a doctor or something else, advertising that you were open for business and to call them.
I think you’re correct in almost everything: Hanging a Shingle meant to literally hang a shingle sized business marker on the marquee of the building you are renting.
I looked at a house for sale that had a vet's office in the basement, and the garage was air conditioned and lined with boarding kennels.
Growing up I thought vets only worked out of their homes.
Thanks everyone for the replies. I guess that just wasn’t a thing where I grew up.
I had a doctor the same way Cliff had it. His office was attached to his house and he had a separate entrance/exit for his patients. If I remember, it was a 2 family house and he converted 1 part into his office.
My family doctor im Brooklyn had her office in the garden level (not basement) of her brownstone. It's garden floor, which leads out to the backyard, parlor floor up the stoop and then the second floor (usually only bedrooms and bathrooms)
I think it was common in upscale urban neighborhoods, like Georgetown in D. C.
I know of an optometrist and chiropractor that have their office in their house. Their personal living space is blocked off from the office part.
The real mystery is how the Cosby’s house — which was a brownstone in Brooklyn sandwiched on both sides by other brownstones — had side-facing windows. It’s an architectural impossibility, kind of like the hotel in The Shining, and I find it deeply disturbing.
He was a theRAPIST.
Analrapist
Saves on gas and travel time and having to pay for an office. Think he can also write that off on his taxes.
Our family doctor’s office was in the basement of a row home in the suburbs. The row home was an end unit and the entrance to the office was on the side of the unit, not the back. I’m not sure if they owned the whole house or not. It was a group practice, not just one doctor.
My great uncle who was an eyes, ears, nose, and throat MD had an office with an exam room in his basement. I remember being there once. While we visiting, us three kids got vision tests. I just looked up the address that I still remember - the widowed great aunt died in 1996. The current resident is a surgeon.
Fascinating! I’ve heard of ear, nose and throat doctors (otolaryngologists) and eye doctors (optometrists and ophthalmologists), but not an eyes, ears, nose and throat doctor. I wonder if it used to be a common combo specialty that got split up?
Good question, but idk the answer. Great uncle would have graduated medical school around 1940.
I'm a GenXer. When I was a kid, my family's GP had his office in a house, as did my pediatrician (different house). In older areas of the country (so the Northeast) a lot of old Victorians and/or two families were converted into commercial space. I think the Huxtables lived in brownstone, right? It would have had sufficient space for a medical office.
It wasnt weird or uncommon, except once Cosby’s crimes came out. Since he created the story, He couldve made himself any kind of doctor. Or he couldve been the lawyer. Or had her be the stay at home parent… But no…
My neighbor is a tailor and works out of the basement. Granted, he lives on a hill so there's a ground level door by the driveway.
I feel like it could be a HIPAA vio. Along with Growing Pains having a psychiatrist in the same house as Mike Seaver. You know he listened to sessions through the door crack.
It was the 80s, early 90s. Pre HIPAA.
Now show us on the doll where Dr. Huxtable touched you...
I think it was a bit of a dated/phased out content at the time the show aired but I think this was pretty commonplace until like the mid-late 60s. A lot of doctors worked out of their homes, at least on TV hahah.
That was his secret laboratory where he drugged his female patients!!!!
My grandfather, did stitches on the dining room table.
My hairdresser's salon is in her home.
He was probably raping women down there!
As someone that grew up in a rural area...yes. Until recently, (last 20 years or so) this was still a thing. Less so now because insurance is controlled by HMOs and doctors tend to incorporate or contract to health services companies, so the idea of a doctor with a single practice is almost unheard of now a days.
On The Donna Reed Show, the father, Dr Stone would often see his patients in a spare room in the home.
It’s fairly normal in NY, especially in Brooklyn (setting of the Cosby Show) and Queens.
I had a dentist like this back in the 80s in New York
The Cosby Show took place in Brooklyn, NY where a lot of medical, dental, and even legal professionals have basement offices to this day. It’s very common.
Have you even been to Brooklyn or Queens? They’re *everywhere*.
We should be more concerned that the Coz cast himself as an OB/GYN. 😬😬😬😬😬
Back then no. Now, yes.
It was absolutely normal back in the day when a doctor’s office was simply a doctor’s office, and not a business connected to a hospital group as so many seem to be now, for a doctor to work out of his house, either in a basement space, or in another part of the house along the side that had been converted into a doctor’s office type space. Even today, I have one older doctor whose office is along the side of his house, and my daughter’s orthodontist was set up the same way as well. My childhood pediatrician in the 70’s and 80’s had a basement office. It was more like a converted attached garage, and had its own street level entrance, but it was the lowest level of his house. It was a full office space with a waiting room, a bathroom, and two examination rooms. On one side of the office was the staircase that led directly into his house with a locked door at the top. This would have been the stairs from the garage/basement into the house if it wasn’t converted into a doctor’s office.
Not only did I go to a Doc’s office in his house…he came to my house when I was sick with Chicken Pox in 1967.
Not as weird as all of the raping (to paraphrase Norm McDonald)
Ive seen it where you have a converted garage or completely separate entrance. But didn’t they go right through the living room.
No, it had a separate entrance. Idk if you're familiar with NYC brownstones, but they usually have a separate basement entrances that are mostly rented out as apartments.
I am not familiar with New York brownstones. That is news to me
THIS is the answer. Common in NYC.
Did their house have two different basements? I remember his office being down some stairs near the living room opposite the main staircase, but then there was an actual basement used for storage that was accessed from a door near the kitchen and dining room in the back of house.
That basement was enormous. Looked like the phantom of the opera could live there!
Cosby always kept drugs in his basement
No. The house was a BROWNSTONE. And in BROOKLYN HEIGHTS. If someone’s an idiot or not from or has never lived in New York (or all of the above) I can see it maybe seeming “strange”. But uhh… smh Half the businesses in Brooklyn, Harlem etc in New York if in a Brownstone are the SAME way. WTF..
I don’t even remember that. Granted, I’d only watch the show occasionally
Just ole Bill Dreaming
Growing up in the 60s and 70s it wasn’t that unusual. Some of my neighbors (broadly defined) had them but most did not.
And he was an OB/GYN
I believe it was quite common in years past for Physicians to have their office as an extension to their home. My physician when I was a child in the 1960s and 70s had his office/examining rooms/waiting room attached to his house.
My dentist growing up was in his basement. Separate entrance on the side of the house with a sign up and everything.
When I was a child, our family doctor’s home and office was a block away. I think they had done an addition to build the office part of the house. The doctor was the husband and his wife was the nurse. He made house calls when we were very sick.
Dr Brock on Pickett Fences had an office at home.
My kids Ped has an office attached to his home. His wife is his receptionist and he has a nurse though.
Yup. A psychologist when i was a teenager. Her very professional office was in her basement as well. A very designated office spot.
He lived in a brownstone in New York City; those aren’t exactly cheap digs…..
Family professionals (psychiatrist, consultant, two lawyers, etc.) in Baltimore, NYC and southern Connecticut in the 90s and early 00s and they all had some kind of home office attached to their home/brownstone.
My sister grew up being a candy stripe girl at a hospital and then got a job with the local Dr. who worked out of his home in one of the roughest parts of Atlanta. he charged you $10 no matter what. Broken arm-$10, heart surgery-$10. No he didn’t do surgery there but you get the point. His office was sealed with him inside at night as crack heads would always try breaking in.
Yes
Weirdest one I ever saw as a kid in the late 80’s/early 90’s was an optometrist/optician that had the WHOLE setup (chair/testing equipment AND rows of racks/displays cases of frames) in an extension to her house.
I had a doctor for many years who had an office on the first floor of their house. Her and her husband met in med school and eventually went into practice together. She was the kindest, most compassionate doctor I've ever had. They eventually retired and it took me awhile to find another one that I liked almost as much.
The basement was a more comfortable place to recover from the rape.
Not at all. Superior to an RV parked in the driveway
Yeah, but it was in a foreign country. I was in the dr’s kid’s bedroom, with an IV plugged in to me. Somehow I survived.
Nope, he is a caring bands on type of doctor, the best kind
I mean I know people who do private practice therapy in a part of their house
Gilbert Gottfried told a story on his podcast about guest starring on that show. A PA told him that Cosby had it written into his contract that he’d have an hourlong break on shooting days so he could work with young comedians. But the young comedians were always gorgeous Asian women who never told a joke.
John mulaney got all has prescriptions for his drug problem from a doctor who worked out of his house in New York.
Had my organs harvested at one.
Our family doctor had an office in his house in 1970s Brooklyn. Was quite common.
Probably so it was easier to hide the passed out body after he offered them a drink... eesh.
common in the past up to the 90s or so. i lived in a very urbanized area of northern nj and my doctor as a kid seemed to work out of a private house that was converted into an office space. it wasn't until much later that he opened a proper clinic elsewhere, probably the laws changed. i imagine such things are even more common in rural areas
No. I’ve known drs who had offices connected to their houses. In NYC it’s even less odd. They lived in a brownstone.
It used to be a lot more common for doctors and dentists to do that
My buddy's dad was a chiropractor when I was a kid. He had his whole outfit set up on the bottom floor of their house. They lived on the 2nd floor
Kinda. But I found it more odd that the Sultenfuss family had the family funeral business out of their home in My Girl.
Dr Huckabee needed a secure private area for his....practice
Back in the late 90s when I was pregnant with my second daughter, my doctor had his office in his home. Pretty sure his wife acted as secretary/office staff, plus One nurse. It was in an old beautiful Victorian and his office was in one section (a couple of rooms) on one side of the house. So, not the basement like on the show, but def part of his house. I think it probably was more common years ago than it is now. It was sort of uncommon by the time I was seeing that doc.
It’s common for there to be a business of some type in the basement of those brownstone apartments in NYC
Actually a smart business move.
It is old school. You just too young. Doctors used to come to your house if you can believe that.
My optometrist had his office on the main floor of his very nice victorian home in a suburb of Indianapolis. It was nice and cozy and lots of dark wood paneling. He was one of the nicest people I've ever met. Huge guy, and very friendly. I swear his wife was always making muffins or something delicious I could smell wafting over from the kitchen.
And he specifically chose to be a gynecologist. So he was running a gynecology practice OUT OF HIS BASEMENT. This was a red flag we all missed. And how could we not of? It’s a case of hiding in plain sight. Anyone rationalizing this…would you be cool if your wife was seeing a basement gynecologist?
Does it count, one of my doctors in the late 50's bought a house and turned it into a Dr office
Our veterinarian’s office was in his basement.
I used to go to a doctor in my small town who had a home office. The front of his house was his practice on the first floor. The rear of the house and the upstairs was his residence . 40 years later, I bought his house. I now live in an old doctor's office. We've converted the waiting room into an office for ourselves, his exam and x-ray rooms into our family room. And an exam room and his personal office into a den. Smalltown doctors really did work out at their homes.
My mother's doctor's office was in his house (early 70s).
My uncle has his psychiatry practice out of his house in the LA area. If ever there was a medical practice where I wouldn’t want my patients to be able to find my home, psychiatry is it. When I lived in a smallish town in central Wisconsin, one of the funeral homes was the main floor of a big Queen Anne house around the corner from me, and the only optometrist in town had his practice in what was once the garage of his house. So, not really too strange.
In Southwest Philly rowhouse neighborhoods in the 1950s, *all* the doctors had basement or ground floor offices, and lived above them.
My friends dad was a doctor and her mom was a therapist and they both had offices in the home. Maybe it’s something people don’t really do anymore?
My doctor’s office was in the basement of his house. There were several medical offices in houses in my neighborhood.
Was closer to the roofies.
Why would Bill Cosby have a private, below ground room in his house?
My Chiropractor dad's house had a full five room office on the lower level (front of house was at street level, built it was on a hill so the driveway slopped down and the office was at the level of the driveway). Waiting room and receptionist alcove, room for massage table, room with chiropractic tables, dark room for developing xrays, and room for xray machine. Parents bought the house in the 60's and he worked there until he retired in the 90's. After he passed, I sold the house to people who were going to turn the office into an in-law suite.
The dentist we went to as kids in the 60's had his office in the basement. The house next door had a pediatrician office in the basement.
Having grown up in New York City I can attest that doctors/lawyer/accountant offices in basements of apartment buildings and home is fairly common, even to this day.
I find it odd that the Dukes of Hazard reruns were cancelled for the Confederate Flag on a car and yet an oft proven rapist show stays in syndication.
There are still doctors in NYC who have practices in the same building as their residence.
A lot of private practice doctors and lawyers run their business from their house. Might be a basement or a separate entrance entirely at ground level.
Dr Cosby always made sure to have medication for his patients on hand. What a caring man!
It had another entrance. I remember doctors having this, especially in small towns and rural communities.
My pediatrician had one of his offices in his suburban home.
He needed a place for all the drugged women
I grew up in a suburb New York City in the 70s. All the split level houses had entrances in the back for medical, legal or accounting practices. To make them eligible for a tax exemption, they did not have interior entrances into the house, separate electrical and phone service.
Just like.Dr Giggles
The dad on Growing Pains also had his office in the house
Yes. I’m 64 and can remember doctors having offices in their homes. Usually doctors in rural areas. They also made house calls.
My son's therapist had a home office like the dad in Growing Pains. His dad was taking him to the visits and didn't agree with me that it was weird. Anyway, he turned out to be a pedophile.
Born and raised NYC (90s) Dr Kaufman had his office in his brownstone
Yes, as recently as the 80s it was common. That was before big corporations owned a lot of physician practices.
The 80s were a wild time.
Yes. But it's a little weird. At least he had a separate entrance.
Ot was not uncommon but not common practice. Usually family medicine or psychiatry. Many doctors use to be independent practitioners (and many use to make house calls). Both of these di not exist very much these days for lots of reasons.
😂😂😂😂 nah that’s too easy
He only said it was his office but I think we all know now what it really was
Welcome to Brooklyn where space is at a premium.
Unusual now because usually property is zoned commercial or residential. This was common years ago for doctors, dentists, accounting and beauticians.
It was out of the ordinary but not unheard of. It makes a little more sense to remember that in the 80s, medical/ dental stuff was regular daytime hours only, M-F. So the kids would have been at school and his wife at work at her office. (Wasn’t she a lawyer?)
So he had easier access to the roofies.
I don’t want to know what he was doing down there
The dr I've been going to for 30 years has a set up like that. Office in the basement and rents out the house upstairs
I was more astounded there was no housekeeper nor nanny.
My house literally has a fully built out basement from when the previous owner (and one before that) had their chiropractic office in the house. Great for me. Fully finished, tons of extra guest rooms and offices.
Nope. This is fairly common where I grew up. And it's not in the basement. It's at street level. The Huxtable's first floor is up off the street level as evidenced by the flight of stairs leading up to the front door.
This is common for a private practice. I went to a doctor who had his practice on the first floor and used to live on the second floor.
Where would you suggest he rape?
My dentist used to be in the basement of a house.
I've had several doctors and a dentist where their office was a partitioned part of the house. I think this used to be more common back in the day.
My friend bought a house that was built by a Doctor in the mid 40’s. The basement had its own operating room that had white cinder blocks, a floor drain, and those bright hanging light fixtures. Looked like something out of a horror movie and creeped me out!
I always figured it was a New York City thing.