A World of Hurt - Clubbies Around the World

As someone who is very engaged in looking for news, medical articles, discussion groups, products, solutions, and kittens (oops, you weren't supposed to see that last item, sorry) related to post-club feet, I am struck by the rather significant differences country to country regarding treatment options, outcomes, etc. And I am not only speaking about the physical ramifications we all face, but the social and familial impacts on people whose only fault was to be born with a disability. Some countries, whether on the Asian sub-continent, or in Africa, or South and Central Americas, either cannot afford adequate treatment, or worse, simply ostracize and even abandon children born with club feet.

But lest we in the Western cultures think we are immune to biases against handicapped people, I recently picked up this little item on my myriad Web travels:


http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article669212.ece

From The Sunday Times
May 28, 2006
Babies with club feet aborted
Lois Rogers
"MORE than 20 babies have been aborted in advanced pregnancy because scans showed that they had club feet, a deformity readily corrected by surgery or physiotherapy.

According to figures from the Office for National Statistics covering the years from 1996 to 2004, a further four babies were aborted because they had webbed fingers or extra digits, which are also corrected by simple surgery. All the terminations took place late in pregnancy, after 20 weeks."

Now, lest you think I am a staunch anything, let me assure you I am a firm believer in a women's right to choose for herself. But what this, and a number of other articles seem to be saying is that the decision is being urged on parents, by doctors. Doctors! Medical professionals who supposedly took the Hippocratic oath. Now, how am I going to approach this issue? Hmm. Ahh, hmm. OK, ARE THESE BOZOS NUTS? How on Earth can a doctor, who should know that club feet is not the same as, oh, the fetus being so damaged that it puts the mother in danger, or won't even survive the birth process, be allowed to remain in practice? This isn't even a case of whether one supports or is totally opposed to the practice of abortion - it's a case of criminal idiocy! As much as us clubbies have chronic pain and associated issues, we are at least here to talk about it. When I hear about cases of children with club feet being abandoned by their parents in third-world countries, I am deeply saddened, but this practice, of not even understanding conditions that are amenable to treatment, that are well documented, well, this is beyond outrageous. It is, if anything, further evidence of selective knowledge. If the parent makes that decision based on what the doctor misinforms them about, that doctor should be sued, stripped of license, and put in hobbles, preferably welded in place.

Now, I am not trying to enter into the pro-or-con debate on abortion here. I am condemning the doctors who counsel such on the basis of clear and dangerous medical ignorance. I think I have made that bias quite clear as it applies to the outcomes many of us clubbies have to deal with. And I feel this position is entirely consistent - either doctors are acting in the best interests of the health of their patient, and applying not merely the knowledge they (hopefully) gained during their educations, but using their minds to inquire beyond the mere literature and into the frontiers of new treatment, or they are doing none of those things, and need to try out for a ditch-digging position. If there is indeed severe genetic damage, that endangers mother and/or fetus, that is one thing. But there is nothing, ANYWHERE IN ANY MEDICAL LITERATURE even suggesting talipes equino-varus poses any such risk. To counsel such a thing on not merely a fallacious basis, but a clearly non-existing one, in patently insane.

Please, someone, anyone, especially within the medical professions, tell me I'm wrong. Because while I know from experience there are ignorant people who are frightened by anyone handicapped from being anywhere near them, I would never advocate for abortion of fetuses suspected of harboring such ignorance in order to rid the world of same.

I'd rather just laugh in their faces.

But I am NOT laughing about this.