Friday, January 30, 2009

And why we aren't respected

So, here's the link to a story about the octuplets born recently.

There are lots of things I'm finding about this story sad/angry. The worst I think is the last paragraph:

Dr. James Grifo, professor of obstetrics and gynecology at the NYU School of Medicine, added: "I don't think it's our job to tell them how many babies they're allowed to have. I am not a policeman for reproduction in the United States. My role is to educate patients."

WTF? What ever happened to first no harm? There is a lot of harm in having a litter for mom and the babies (and please don't tell me 8 babies aren't a litter). I don't care how large of a family they want, but I think 1-2 at a time, please! That's not policing family size, that's being sensible.

I highly doubt that 8 babies happen naturally. I also think that we, as doctors, should absolutely avoid super-multiples...by monitoring our Clomid patients. By not implanting large numbers of embryos.

Oh, and can you imagine the shitting of the pants of the various neonatologists when they realized they needed one more set-up?

1 comment:

rlbates said...

I so agree with you. The risks to the mom and babies was way too high to be (in my humble opinion) to be good medicine.