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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

About this GP

458 replies

slightlyconfused85 · 11/08/2015 15:24

Now before I start I generally think Gps are amazing people, I'm not dissing the profession. Today, however, I booked an appointment to get the contraceptive pill after the birth of my 2nd child. I was given an appointment with a locum who explained my options to me, then said he didn't prescribe contraception for ethical reasons. I then had to wait 45 minutes for another gp to be able to fit me in to prescribe this for me. Aibu to think that if the gp surgery is going to have locums that won't do this then they could have let me know on the phone when I booked? I know the receptionist didn't know what I wanted but they could say if it's an appointment to discuss contraception then say and we will find a different GP. Had loads of time wasted today and feeling (probably irrationally) irritable about it!

OP posts:
CatWithKittens · 14/08/2015 19:28

I am going to take one on my nine lives in my paws for I think a lot of people are not thinking through the consequences of what they are saying. What people seem to be ignoring is that doctors and nurses who will have no part in teminations of pregnancy take that view because they care about life, and that may well be why they joined the profession in the first place. You may think they are wrong but would you rather have an unprincipled doctor or nurse who is simply in it for the money or one who thinks deeply about his or her practice and what is right and wrong? There have been examples of doctors who have either had no personal ethics to take to, or have left them at the door of, their surgery, concentration camp or other place of practice. The world has not been a better place for them. I would rather have a doctor with a conscience, even if I think he is wrong in his or her conscientious concerns, than one with no conscience or ethics - provided of course he or she follows the GMC guidance designed to ensure patients get full access to full advice. Moreover there has been some ranting against men in this thread on the assumption that it is only men who have conscientious objections to terminations or contraception - that is obviously incorrect. As one poster pointed out a senior midwife (a woman) was reluctant to draw up rosters which included care for women after termination. I know at least one female GP - a very good and caring one - who does not refer for terminations. A little more balance and human sympathy for other people and their deeply held beliefs would really not do any harm in this thread. We are in danger of trying to force everybody into one mode of thinking as the only possible ways of being for society in the same way as homophobia and ill-treatment of the illegitimate once did.

CoogerAndDark · 14/08/2015 19:31

You're equating a legal medication which can be used to make the lives of women easier and less painful and not just in preventing pregnancy and equating it with concentration camps?

Amazing.

CoogerAndDark · 14/08/2015 19:35

I think you will find your points about medical professionals indulging in eugenics perfectly illustrate the dangers of hiding behind 'Ethics' though Smile

TenForward82 · 14/08/2015 19:38

who thinks deeply about his or her practice and what is right and wrong?
Right and wrong for them. NOT for the patient. The "ethical" beliefs against contraception and abortion rely on the "life at any cost" line of thinking, which ignores the rights of the main patient: the woman in front of them.

unprincipled
"Following medical practices allowed by law" is not "unprincipled".

concentration camp or other place of practice
Except torturing and killing people is illegal and offering contraception or terminating a pregnancy is NOT.

some ranting against men in this thread on the assumption that it is only men who have conscientious objections to terminations or contraception - that is obviously incorrect
#notallmen, yes, we know.

We are in danger of trying to force everybody into one mode of thinking as the only possible ways of being for society in the same way as homophobia and ill-treatment of the illegitimate once did.
Since we're actively battling against sexism and other -isms, I'll just say: "wut?" Although I will add that I'm not trying to force anybody in one mode of thinking. I don't care what they think. In fact, I SO DON'T CARE what they think that I don't want to hear what they think when I ask for contraception or a termination. They can think what they like in their heads, as long as they don't a) tell me, or b) pass me off to somebody else "who does deal with that stuff, although I'm totally not judging you, honest."

Anniesaunt · 14/08/2015 19:41

cat I consider myself to be very caring and I care very much about life. I resent the suggestion that I don't have ethics, don't care am just I it for the money just because I will not impose my own views on others.

I have some very strong ethical beliefs and one of those is that as a professional I have no rights to impose my personal views on a patient and care should be decided on solely based on objective assessment of medical need. As I am personally against abortion I have not tried to get a job in the theatres doing abortions. However if someone came to my ward ill because of a complication of an abortion fir example I view it as my professional and moral duty to care for them to the same standard as I care for any other patients.

If we promote the refusal to treat patients on grounds of the personal morality if the HCP then where does it end?

Christinayanglah · 14/08/2015 19:46

A little more balance and human sympathy? Where is the balance and sympathy for the patient?

I don't agree with child abuse or acts carried out by some sex offenders, however the job is about providing a service for all, it is what I signed up for

Pneumometer · 14/08/2015 19:48

Well, it's always good to collect data points to continue proving just how right Mike Godwin was.

Sixweekstowait · 14/08/2015 19:50

Just watching C4 news on the situation in Chile re abortion- it also mentioned the little, yes little girl in Paraguay - so you caring ethical HCPs would allow an abused 11 year old to give birth? And your own raped 10 year old?

LoloKazolo · 14/08/2015 19:50

Cat, I agree with you.

(I am pro choice.)

When thinking about the role of "the professional", I think principally of a person who can advise me on serious and complex subjects and who will take responsibility for that advice harming me if I follow it.

Legality and morality are not synonymous. I think so long as everyone has the right to access an abortion, it's wise to allow professionals to recuse themselves from enabling them personally. The alternative is to make professionals simply functionaries - directed to perform tasks and not to think about them. We already have those. I think we need professionals too.

Sixweekstowait · 14/08/2015 19:52

Annie - if you were the only available member of staff and it was a little girl?

Anniesaunt · 14/08/2015 19:53

So lolo do you agree that I and others like me are unethical because we believe that it is not our place to impose our personal ethics on others?

Sixweekstowait · 14/08/2015 19:53

Lolo- no, let them choose a different area of medicine and not leave the 'unethical' tasks to others

Anniesaunt · 14/08/2015 19:54

What do you mean bourdic?

LoloKazolo · 14/08/2015 19:58

Er, no, Anniesaunt? I mean, that's a strawman you've built all by yourself there, I think.

bumbleymummy · 14/08/2015 20:02

I agree with a lot of what you have written CatWithKittens .

Ten Just because something is legal doesn't automatically make it right. Hasn't history taught us that yet?

Anniesaunt · 14/08/2015 20:03

I'm completely lost about what you are trying to say. I said I personally am against abortion. I did not specifically look for a job carrying out abortions but if I had a patient who had or was having an abortion I felt I was morally obliged to give them the same quality of care as any other patient I treated.

TenForward82 · 14/08/2015 20:04

Er, what exactly are we talking about, bumbley? Because there's a lot of legal things I don't agree with (the right to push your views on your patients, for one), but we're talking about quite specific things, here.

Anniesaunt · 14/08/2015 20:05

Meant to add can someone explain what I said that was wrong and what bourduc's question means because I cannot answer until I understand the question?

TenForward82 · 14/08/2015 20:07

No clue, Annie shrug

CoogerAndDark · 14/08/2015 20:10

Just because someone's Ethics say something is right doesn't make it right.

Refusing to treat a woman, with a legal medication, is the same as refusing to treat someone who has a disability because your screwed up Ethics tell you that person would have been better off not being born.

bumbleymummy · 14/08/2015 20:10

Ten: I was referring to this comment. "Following medical practices allowed by law" is not "unprincipled".

And doctors aren't allowed to 'push their views on their patients'. From reading one of the links that someone upthread posted, they aren't even allowed to discuss them with their patients.

CoogerAndDark · 14/08/2015 20:12

Except for using loaded words like "ethically unable" and shunting them off to another HCP, if one is available

TenForward82 · 14/08/2015 20:13

A) By saying "I don't deal with this by my colleague does", there's no other logical conclusion about their personal views

B) Ok, so exactly what "legal but not automatically right" medical procedures are you referring to here?

WorldofTofuness · 14/08/2015 20:13

Re contraception vs abortion, I think pragmatically there are enough differences that ItRW no-one would want to be receive an abortion from someone who really doesn't want to perform one. Getting the Pill is presumably quite an objective, tick-box exercise, ie are there any objective contra-indications for this patient, has she been given information (facts, not woo) about its risks etc.could be done by the GP without really having to engage their personal feelings at all. Whereas with an abortion a good outcome obviously relies on staffs' desire to do a good jobnot that an objector would necessarily cock things up deliberately as 'punishment', but attitude to the patient could unconsciously affect even something as basic as how thoroughly after-care is done. (My mum was mistreated by a nurse who she'd earlier heard slagging off her choice of medical treatmentnot abortion-relatedso yes, this does happen.)

And this thing about specifying a GP who will provide contraception: really, with current appt waiting times? At my surgery, if you don't state any GP preference whatsoever, it will quite often take 3 wks to get an appt. Fortunately, being in London there are plenty of other places to get prescribed contraceptives; but elsewhere, if faced with a long wait until the 'right' GP is around, I'd imagine dodgy online sales could start to look relatively attractive...

TenForward82 · 14/08/2015 20:15

GPs don't perform abortions, and as a paid professional I expect you to do your job well whether you agree with it or not. If you can't do that, you're not the "amazing" "top of the class" doctor that earlier posters have referred to.

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