Posted on 11/01/2006 4:38:55 PM PST by Piefloater
IN a controversial treatment, doctors in the US have given a severely disabled child drugs to keep her small and 'manageable' for her parents.
In a report published in a medical journal this month, the doctors described a six-year-old girl with profound, irreversible developmental disability who was given high doses of estrogen to permanently halt her growth so that her parents could continue to care for her at home.
The controversial growth-attenuation treatment, which included hysterectomy, was requested by the child's parents and initiated after careful consultation and review by an ethics committee.
In their report in the Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, doctors Daniel F. Gunther and Douglas S. Diekema, both at the University of Washington in Seattle, explained the reasoning behind what they hoped would generate healthy debate.
Dr Gunther is at the Division of Pediatric Endocrinology, and Dr Diekema is at the Centre for Pediatric Bioethics.
Caring for children with profound developmental disabilities could be difficult and demanding, they said.
For children with severe combined neurologic and cognitive impairment who are unable to move without assistance, all the necessities of life dressing, bathing, transporting must be provided by caregivers, usually parents, and these tasks become increasing difficult, if not impossible, as the child increases in size.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.com.au ...
This is a lot closer to reality than one might expect. In the case of our own son, while temporarily in a well known facility, something like that could have happened. Doctors proposed to us a spinal implantation which would correct the scoliosis naturally occurring in such handicaps. It would amount to a rigid rod attached to the spine. They assured us it would make our son look more normal, but warned only 50% survived. We told them to stuff their operation. Our son's room mate who was in similar straits was a happy, smiling kid, a joy to be around. But his parents acquiesced and he got the operation. He never smiled again, died a few months later in pain.
What nonsense. You sound like a Democrat arguing for just one more little tax increase.
Just put a plastic bag over her head and tape it shut. Why go about something half-assed?
That's an ad hominem.
Do you say the same thing to persons who claim that parents should sacrifice a bit more to care for difficult children rather than commit infanticide? If not, why not?
-A8
Puberty is not pretty thing in girls of any range of mental retardation. On your logic, we should therefore give them all hysterectomies.
Personally I dont think that is a bad idea.
That’s like saying that if a person lost one leg, then it is ethically permissible to remove the other.
If it is a management issue and the poor soul doesnt realize what is going on, what difference would it make?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.