Intersex patients routinely had diagnoses withheld by doctors(bbc.co.uk)
bbc.co.uk
Intersex patients routinely had diagnoses withheld by doctors
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-39979186
5 comments
So she was lied not only by doctors, but also by her parents. She was underage so doctors didn't have to tell her, and couldn't tell her if parents prohibited them... soo... yeah doctors lie.
My understanding (which seems consistent with comments in the article) is that at that time, not telling the child was fairly standard medical practice, and thus would likely have been the doctors' recommendation to the parents. I've seen other stories in the past where parents of intersex children have said essentially, "We were so confused and in shock, we just went along with what the doctor said would be best." So yeah, all of the adults involved are culpable, but in a lot of cases it really was the medical experts driving the decision.
Indeed, and at the time when this was done to her, and for most of her life, she had no legal right to see her own medical records. IIRC That was only introduced sometime in the 80s in the UK.
Of course, because doctors knew that patients couldn't see their records, they wrote stuff in them with the expectation that it would never be read by a patient. When the law changed, this was a major point of contention.
I believe that this kind of thing should be considered criminal. It reminds me of this case: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stump_v._Sparkman
The patient should always be informed of their condition and what the therapy or surgery that they are undergoing is about.
The patient should always be informed of their condition and what the therapy or surgery that they are undergoing is about.
Not only to children. I'm intersex and not physically obviously so outwardly. But if you are able to do some imagining that we probably don't really want to write down here, the fact I'm internally female became profoundly apparent in my thirties. H2G2 fans will possibly appreciate I finally was fully cognisant only when 42. I endured a more than decade long breakdown which totalled my business. Meanwhile my family found records on our fathers death, did not tell me, arguably persecuted me, and I narrowly survived a decade long campaign to render me into care of mental health services. Avoiding which involved preferring prison on made up charges ( because family would not explain their reasons) and the physical re-emergence of a secondary organ system.. when I has my hand in a cast for a broken finger, the good fingers muscles became solid stuff within a few weeks. Now take the really not insignificant muscle of a female abdomen and leave it disused for forty years. I had shrunken by several inches due to compression of my lower spine.
Not only do my doctors lie, the records such as a x-ray which the radiologist was so shocked by despite forewarning to sieze the screen out of my sight, is destroyed or deleted. I struggled to walk much of last summer.
I'm amazed that I got ... I'm amazed I survived.
As for finding support our there being in London... There's none. Full stop. Period.
Oh and the fun only is hinted at here. Imagine where I found out first.. if you could guess how, you'd be psychic. Or heaphrodite. It seems to be edited now, but the Wikipedia article had it that hermaphrodites are noted throughout history for ability to predict the future, usually the unfortunate future. I reflected on the statement and realised that humans just spend far too much time dwelling on bad things despite being massively de risked in modern society. Unless you're hermaphrodite and don't know it. If you ponder how this can be undiscovered so long, the missing information is a heretofore blocked out epic history of suffering abuse.
I'm posting this because of my fear anyone else like me has been in far less confident or provident situations and the least I can offer you if this is you is a guaranteed laugh at my expense. I'm slowly getting patched in to the real world needs of addressing the concomitant problems and may be able to help in some practical ways despite I sadly must disclaim any promise as the whole proposition is new to me and I barely caught my breath just now.
Not only do my doctors lie, the records such as a x-ray which the radiologist was so shocked by despite forewarning to sieze the screen out of my sight, is destroyed or deleted. I struggled to walk much of last summer.
I'm amazed that I got ... I'm amazed I survived.
As for finding support our there being in London... There's none. Full stop. Period.
Oh and the fun only is hinted at here. Imagine where I found out first.. if you could guess how, you'd be psychic. Or heaphrodite. It seems to be edited now, but the Wikipedia article had it that hermaphrodites are noted throughout history for ability to predict the future, usually the unfortunate future. I reflected on the statement and realised that humans just spend far too much time dwelling on bad things despite being massively de risked in modern society. Unless you're hermaphrodite and don't know it. If you ponder how this can be undiscovered so long, the missing information is a heretofore blocked out epic history of suffering abuse.
I'm posting this because of my fear anyone else like me has been in far less confident or provident situations and the least I can offer you if this is you is a guaranteed laugh at my expense. I'm slowly getting patched in to the real world needs of addressing the concomitant problems and may be able to help in some practical ways despite I sadly must disclaim any promise as the whole proposition is new to me and I barely caught my breath just now.
Was not underaged when they family encouraged him to marry with another men at 28, without telling him or their husband, the truth. Very sad.
I think the more correct pronoun would be he. He was lied to and lived most of his life as a female because of it.
Everybody lies.
This.
But if the doctors really cared about it enough they could have simply refused to say anything, forwarding questions to the parents instead. But instead they made up an imaginary condition.
But if the doctors really cared about it enough they could have simply refused to say anything, forwarding questions to the parents instead. But instead they made up an imaginary condition.
This is not a new thing, it has been known since before the 2000s, and was written extensively about by Fausto-Sterling in her book Sexing The Body. Doctors -- even today -- routinely withhold this information from intersex children, believing that it is for their own good. Unlike the article's suggestion, it is a widespread practice not limited to the UK.
A fun fact about the idea that you can ask for your medical records, is that the staff may redact any information they think would be harmful to you.
A fun fact about the idea that you can ask for your medical records, is that the staff may redact any information they think would be harmful to you.
How do doctors, parents, anybody think this is a good idea? Hiding things from kids that are guaranteed to become a problem later in life is rather a guarantee that the person will be traumatized when they do find out, and have major trust problems from there on out.
See these links for more regarding treatment in the US:
[0] Long Atlantic article - https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2014/07/should-we...
[1] Brief NBC article with a couple interviews - http://www.nbcnews.com/id/6994580/ns/health-childrens_health...