Women have reproductive duty, says 'rhythm' doctor

[jenny_islander]

"Oh, hey, I get to use your time and money for my bully pulpit because it's not like the thing I am campaigning to take away from you should matter to you, GOL. And anyway I am just SO righteous, lookitmeeeee!"

Doctor should have left standing instructions to the receptionist to tell all callers that birth control would not be on offer.

[mockingbird]

WTF??? A doctor cannot choose to deny a patient care. Are you saying that if an insulin dependent diabetic eats something that sends her blood sugar over the safe amount the doctor can refuse to prescribe insulin because the doctor thinks the patient should control their blood sugar though diet only?

If a patient arrives in the emergency dept due to a drug overdose, can the doctor refuse care because he/she doesn't think someone who does illegal drugs should get care?

Are you saying a Jehovah Witness doctor can refuse to order a blood transfusion to a patient because it goes against his/her beliefs. :angry-banghead:

Hope you or your loved ones never have a health issue your doctor refuses to treat "because it's what he chooses"

:

This. I think allowing doctors to choose to act on their beliefs with regards to established medical standard of care is bullshit. There are plenty of situations in medicine in which the plan of action isn't clear and doctors must rely on their professional and ethical judgment. In that type of situation a doctor or other healthcare professional may feel ethically sound in refusing to do what the patient wants. However, when there is already an established plan (the standard of care) patients expect this to be provided to them as part of their contract, so to speak, with the doctor. Allowing doctors the choice to refuse to provide this type of care violates that contract and means they aren't doing their job. Here if you refuse to provide standard-of-care treatment you can get your license revoked. If we allow doctors choice on these matters we risk situations like in the post I quoted. (Not to mention that it's not the doctor's place to make a choice about family planning for their patient by refusing to provide birth control.) In the US and I assume NZ pretty sure the standard of care regarding reasons to prescribe birth control INCLUDES USING IT FOR BIRTH CONTROL. (And I do think at minimum if doctors are allowed to choose not to prescribe birth control, or provide any other standard service, they should be required to advertise that. I think allowing this choice though, especially because it's always/only about BC and abortions rather than other beliefs like JW doctors giving blood transfusions, is just another attempt to control women's choices and should be done away with.)

I just don't understand these people anyway. If you don't want to prescribe birth control why are you even an OBGYN to begin with? Getting off on the power trip? :angry-banghead:

[Marian the Librarian]

---

She should have just gone to another Doctor. I"m siding with the doctor on this because its what he chooses, just like how a plastic surgeon would not choose to do lipo on someone 300 lbs overweight.

Methinks I smell a troll.

[GeoBQn]

I think there is a movement to get more anti-choice and anti-contraception people in medical fields. My local state university has top programs in medicine, dentistry, pharmacy, etc. There is a chapter of an organization called "Pharmacists for Life." I looked at their website, and it includes tips on how to proselytize to people while they are picking up their prescriptions. This sort of thing royally pisses off my aunt, who is a pharmacist and Jewish.

[Burris]

She should have just gone to another Doctor. I"m siding with the doctor on this because its what he chooses, just like how a plastic surgeon would not choose to do lipo on someone 300 lbs overweight.

I assume you're pretending to be this stupid for the laughs.

There’s a difference between the refusal to provide a potentially dangerous elective surgery to someone who, by virtue of age or weight for example, is unsuitable for the requested procedure; and refusing to provide a simple, relatively safe proscription to someone based merely on your belief that seven billion human beings aren’t enough.

A doctor can choose to leave the medical profession if his ability to provide basic medical care is so deeply compromised by his personal beliefs that he can’t even fill a simple prescription for birth-control pills.

[scc12]

My maternal grandmother died from a septic miscarriage.This was in 1932.She left behind 6 small kids at age 27,the youngest of which was my mom whom was 1 yr old,and didn't recall her at all.The last and 7th pregnancy was her downfall.

I'd like to think it couldn't happen in this day and age,however,I'm probably wrong.

[Miggy]

My fundy-cousin-in-law trained as a pharmacist but couldn't work in a private chemist because, in his words "I would have to sell condoms or the pill to unmarried people." As much as I like to snark about his beliefs, in this case he got it right and went to work in a hospital where his beliefs didn't clash with his ability to work.

There are many different areas of medicine for a doctor to work in. If he isn't prepared to prescribe birth control, he needs to choose something other than General Practice!

[Phoebe]

I'm not saying its the same, but you aren't going to die if you can't get your bc pills. Can you admit that? I'm just saying no one obligated to do what you want.

Excuse me?

There are any number of medical conditions that contraindicate pregnancy: cystic fibrosis, pulmonary artery hypertension, Marfans syndrome with aortic dilation, aortic or mitral valve stenosis, epilepsy, many other cardiac conditions, most chronic pulmonary conditions, "brittle" diabetes (most type-1 diabetic women are encouraged to avoid pregnancy), chronic kidney disease (which can lead to kidney failure), recent cancer diagnosis, clotting disorders, polycythemia, poorly controlled asthma, cytomegalovirus infection, autoimmune disorders, and any condition for which a Pregnancy Risk Class X drug is prescribed.

This is NOT an exhaustive list by any stretch of the imagination; this is what I was able to find with a mere 3 minutes of Google search. I recommend you educate yourself further before making such irresponsible statements in future.

You know, I just posted this and then realized I wasn't done.

That statement you made, the one I quoted above? It's complete, utter, and deliberately ignorant bullshit. It's the last part that really gets to me -- you have chosen (by not doing your due diligence research-wise) to maintain a simplistic, pseudolegalistic version of the world that accords with your beliefs but has no basis in actual reality. It's disgusting.

[Jinger Jar]

I don't know about New Zealand, but in the US there are OB/GYNs who run natural family planning (NFP) practices. They advertise themselves as such, and women who choose to receive their reproductive and pregnancy-related health care from them know what to expect.

If this physician finds prescribing pharmaceutical birth control to be morally repugnant, he either needs to find a job where he will not be asked to do so, or he needs to make that information abundantly clear to all of his patients before they book appointments and assume all the risks that entails vis-a-vis receiving payments from the NZ government/insurance companies (I don't know how health care is covered in NZ, sorry).

The way this doctor is running his practice now, he's little more than a self-righteous bully with a prescription pad.

[cindyluvs24]

I also propose that it be illegal to prescribe Viagra to unmarried men, right? :nenner:

[argypargy]

While this doctor is an idiot, to say the rythm method is unreliable is a bit offbase. If a woman has regular cycles, know her fertile signs, charts her basal body temperature (only way to confirm ovulation without ultrasounds and bloodwork), the rythm method can work spectacularly well. I use this method because my body does not do well on hormonal BC. If a woman's cycle is irregular, then the rythm method doesn't work so well.

However, if a woman wants BC, give her BC. She is a human and capable of making decisions about her own body.

[doggie]

While this doctor is an idiot, to say the rythm method is unreliable is a bit offbase. If a woman has regular cycles, know her fertile signs, charts her basal body temperature (only way to confirm ovulation without ultrasounds and bloodwork), the rythm method can work spectacularly well. I use this method because my body does not do well on hormonal BC. If a woman's cycle is irregular, then the rythm method doesn't work so well.

However, if a woman wants BC, give her BC. She is a human and capable of making decisions about her own body.

but do you think a 16 year old can manage that?

[Anxious Girl]

I think anti-choicers have some serious identity issues. 1 of my theories is that their mothers were forced into having them by societal pressure/family and friends and not because their mothers and or parents wanted children. To reach out to other people in their situation, they want revenge on all women to be forced to go through their pregnancies with anti-choice laws so that no child can claim that they were unwanted (unplanned and then wanted/unplanned and gave up for adoption) which is pure bullshit.

[Jinger Jar]

but do you think a 16 year old can manage that?

I've known teenagers who've used NFP to monitor their menstrual cycles and overall gynecological health. The nurse who serves as an NFP instructor at my parish taught her daughters Billings when were young teens, and one of them self-diagnosed a some kind of menstrual problem when she was 18 or 19. She told the doctor what was wrong, the doctor didn't believe her at first because what kid knows about the inner workings of her hoo-hoo so well, and the doc did a big backtrack when the tests came back saying exactly what the kid said. :lol: This was the same kid who was told by doctors she was going to have trouble conceiving, and she used Billings to get pregnant within a year of her getting married.

Can every teen use Billings or Marquette accurately? Probably not. Should they be able to learn it if that's something they want to explore? Yes. If we believe they're capable of deciding if they want to use medication, I think we have to believe they're capable of deciding if they want to monitor and chart their mucus.

[Mommy22alyns]

Okay, I just cannot get past "reproductive duty." REPRODUCTIVE DUTY!?!!?!?!?!

[walnut]

Doc or not, priest or not, woman or man, young or old, friend or enemy, ain't nobody gon' tell me what to do with my ovaries! I don't gamble, so I don't mind gamblin' with my ovaries and see where the chips fall. We'll see and everyone else stfu about anybody else's nest of ovaries, tyvm!

[walnut]

I take an antidepressant in order to live my life as a functional adult, and without it, I would almost certainly commit suicide.

The drug I take has been demonstrated to cause birth defects, and cannot be taken during pregnancy. I have tried more than a dozen different antidepressants, and this is the only one that works for me. Because of the risks, my doctor insists that I remain on prescription birth control for as long as I am taking the antidepressant.

So yes, Mormon Fundie Troll, birth control is life-or-death for me.

I haz dis box full of warm, fuzzy hugz... feel free to take any you need. And :ignore: mode on. We don't step in dogpoo on purpose. Your life has value, therefore you'll preserve it and you'll continue taing your pills. :wink-penguin:

[SpeakNow]

While this doctor is an idiot, to say the rythm method is unreliable is a bit offbase. If a woman has regular cycles, know her fertile signs, charts her basal body temperature (only way to confirm ovulation without ultrasounds and bloodwork), the rythm method can work spectacularly well. I use this method because my body does not do well on hormonal BC. If a woman's cycle is irregular, then the rythm method doesn't work so well.

However, if a woman wants BC, give her BC. She is a human and capable of making decisions about her own body.

The rhythm method does not work for me at all. I can go anywhere from 20 to 75 days between periods. I think that while it can work well for some people, doctors should not force women to using one BC method that may not work for them.

[ADoyle90815]

The rhythm method does not work for me at all. I can go anywhere from 20 to 75 days between periods. I think that while it can work well for some people, doctors should not force women to using one BC method that may not work for them.

This. Nobody should force women to use a birth control method that doesn't work for them. For many women, especially those who have suffered from severe PPD, it's best for them to take hormonal birth control, as another pregnancy could make things worse, and it really is a life and death issue. As for Mormonism, from what I do know, the official stance on birth control is that it's up to the couple and God, not their local leaders. Like many others, I first thought that the Mormon cult banned birth control due to the fact that Mormon couples have larger families, but that's not actually the case. Otherwise, there would be Mormon cases similar to Andrea Yates.

[argypargy]

but do you think a 16 year old can manage that?

She could if that's the choice that she makes. However, I believe that if a 16yo wants the BC pill, she should get the BC pill. It is easier than the rythm method, for sure. I was just commenting on someone saying the rythm method was unreliable. It's not, if you have regular cycles and you do the things I stated.

[argypargy]

The rhythm method does not work for me at all. I can go anywhere from 20 to 75 days between periods. I think that while it can work well for some people, doctors should not force women to using one BC method that may not work for them.

Yes. That's why I said "If a woman's cycle is irregular, then the rhythm method doesn't work so well." Quite honestly, a woman can be totally regular and then she has an off cycle where she ovulates later, etc.

[sassycupcake]

I haz dis box full of warm, fuzzy hugz... feel free to take any you need. And :ignore: mode on. We don't step in dogpoo on purpose. Your life has value, therefore you'll preserve it and you'll continue taing your pills. :wink-penguin:

Thank you. You are lovely <3

[jenny_islander]

Anybody who thinks the Pill is a frill is welcome to my 7 days of nonstop cramps, rather like being kicked by a mule wearing hot horseshoes, with bleeding so heavy I would go through several overnight maxis during one school day, as well as constant thirst. After that was over, I would get 3 weeks of PMS, then a week of bleeding, then 3 more weeks of mood swings, bloating, and cravings, then a week of bleeding . . . When I went on the Pill, it all went away.

[Trynn]

Right now, my "reproductive duty" is to really not. I'm not stable mentally, financially, or spiritually. I got no business having a child right now when I'm too messed up to care for it.

I take hormonal bc for cramps, and can't believe I waited this long to do so.

[longskirtlotsakids]

Pill birth control isn't life or death. Why can't someone say no?

Would you say yes as a plastic surgeon if a 17 year old came with her parents to get breast implants?

)

1)Women die every day from complications of pregnancy and birth , dumbass.

2)Maybe yes, maybe no. I can't say,and neither can you, because we aren't fucking doctors..