I know a woman who had her tubes tied at 30, AFTER having three kids, and even then she said she had a hard time convincing a doctor that she was really really sure she didn’t want to have any more children and really really wanted to have the procedure.
This attitude is pretty obnoxious, but I don’t know that this is a problem that can be legally addressed without interfering with the rights of doctors. I don’t think a doctor can be required by law to perform an elective procedure. The patient is, in theory, free to find another doctor who is willing to perform the requested procedure.
The problem comes when the patient can’t find another doctor who is willing to perform the procedure. In some areas this is also an issue when it comes to abortion. It may be perfectly legal for the woman to seek an abortion, but there might not be any local doctors who perform them. This is a bad situation to be sure, but I don’t see an easy solution to it.
A simply discrimination lawsuit is unlikely to work, as a vasectomy is not actually the same procedure as a tubal ligation. The latter is more expensive, more invasive, and more dangerous. I doubt that the same doctor would normally be qualified to perform both procedures, so it would be unusual for a woman to be able to say “This doctor could sterilize me but won’t, but is perfectly happy to sterilize a man.”
Endometriosis is a strange condition and I feel sorry for any woman who has it. My sister wanted to get one when her endometriosis got really bad. She has since had a child and her endometriosis symptoms have gone away. I have heard a similar story from someone I went to school with when I did a paper on endometriosis. If you don’t want kids then you should be allowed to get the procedure.
One thing I would add is that it’s a lot easier and more reliable for a man to freeze some sperm and use it later if he changes his mind.
Additionally, there is no permanent-ish male birth control system, unlike the Pill, IUDs, NuvaRing, Depo-Provera, etc. Basically, the only types of birth control that a man has any say in are the barrier methods (condoms, etc).
I wonder if there are any statistics related to how many men/women get vasectomies/tubal ligations regret their decision and try to have it reversed? If there is a large difference between these numbers, that might explain some of the reticence to perform these procedures.
Now, the issue that Jillvyn refers to is very different. Sounds like her doctors have been a bunch of jerks.
Not that I’m an expert, but having her tubes tied shouldn’t do that to a woman since her ovaries are still there. It’s the difference between a vasectomy and castration.
She was talking about what excuses the doctors were using to refuse her; “biological clock” clearly meaning that they think she’ll suddenly want a baby.
Good point. The only male contraceptive is a condom and if it fails he has no control over results. Women have several methods of contraception and the option of terminating the pregnancy if they fail…
I probably won’t ever have kids biologically, because of medical issues-all the meds I’m on, the seizures, etc. Would that make a difference? (Apparently, lamictal can cause birth defects, and the recently when the doctor tried a new type of drug, I ended up having grand mals every other week). So if I ever want to have kids, I’ll have to adopt.
I’d be curious to see a study reflecting how often such a request is refused. It would not surprise me (a physician) to find out that it is, in fact, commonly refused, particularly to nulliparous women.
Why?
Tradition is probably the simplest answer, annoying as it might be, especially if the woman is young. With respect to this reason, I suspect younger and (possibly) female Ob-Gyn surgeons might be better prospects to ask.
Other reasons that I suspect are advanced:
It is a more complicated to reverse if the woman does change her mind. Most Ob-Gyn surgeons are going to have at least some anecdotal experience with patients who decide to have a baby late in life.
It involves more risk than a vasectomy. It is not risky in absolute terms, although of course for a given individual factors such as obesity would come into play for increasing risk.
Having suggested those two weak reasons I wonder if there is third one: it’s just not worth the bother of figuring out if it’s really the right decision for a young and childless woman to undertake. I mean, to do it right you would have to make sure she’s not a nut; that her psychologic state is good; that she’s not gonna come back and haunt you…etc etc. Fair or not, I’d venture a guess that physicians don’t think the chance a male patient would blame them for a too-hasty vasectomy is as high as the chance a female patient would. While it may be the political position du jour that modern women are as capable of standing behind their decisions as modern men, I don’t think that’s the perception. So it’s easier to just not risk being the doctor who did it.
Here’s a study for a little ammo. It’s very small, and it’s very old. But it’s the sort of thing I might take into a physician’s office if I were trying to persuade her.
There may be newer ones. And as always, there is usually a niche market for some guy willing to do what others pass up. So the trick is to ask “Who will?” if your doc happens to think procreation is some sort of sacrosant opportunity that no woman in her right mind would pass up.
Let me be the first to encourage all you women to remain childless. Despite my criticism of Anti-Natalists in another thread, I am closet member. Life would be so convenient without any children in the world. Until I need them to pay off our national debt, anyway.
One last thing: you can’t really make a law ordering doctors to do a particular surgery. Damn prima donnas (Prime donne? Primi uomini?).
Have we become such a ridiculous and litigous society that the idea that someone fully conseting to a certain procedure will have a doctor perform it without error and still get sued by malpractice because the victim changed their minds about it?
If so, nuke us from orbit, it’s the only way to be sure.
At the bottom of this article are a number of additional studies looking at post-sterilization regret (First nineteen cites, I believe). I did not look through the cites themselves.
Clarification:** Young women, like all women, should
be counselled about the permanency of sterilization
and the availability of alternative, long-term, highly
effective methods. Evidence: Studies show that up to 20% of women
sterilized at a young age later regret this decision, and
that young age is one of the strongest predictors of
regret (including request for reversal information and
obtaining reversal) that can be identified before
sterilization. Cites 1-19*
You might look through the articles cited to see if nulliparous women were parsed out from those who had children.
Except that hormonal birth control has significant side effects for many women–and yes, you can always try a wide variety of types and find an option that works better for you, but that can literally take years – that’s years of significant weight gain and a cratered libido, and there’s no promise that you will actually find anything that works in the end. If a woman is positive she won’t ever want to have kids, why should she have to go through all that?
I would contact Planned Parenthood for a referral to a doctor who treats women as if they are adults and does not believe in prolonged suffering until she’s a big girl in her thirties or forties. Yes, she may regret it. She may regret cosmetic surgery too, but that doesn’t slow surgeons down much in that field.
Women who choose hysterectomies should talk to other women who have had the work done to see how it has affected their sex lives. Doctors aren’t as informative as they should be. Maybe it’s because male surgeons don’t realize what a change it can make.
I came across this tidbit today in [url=http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1865975,00.html]Time Magazine, which is about Essure: “a newer, cheaper, faster, scalpel-free alternative to tubal ligation”
But you know what? Who cares? The medical establishment should not discriminate against women based on the fact that some women regret it later on. How easy is it to just have the patient sign a form stating that they are aware of what they are doing and agree not to sue later on?? I think it’s shameful that women have to go through this…
I don’t doubt the figure, but how does one qualify this? Everyone has regrets. But since there is no real way to see if they really regret it enough to fix it, the question is not valid.
What I mean is, suppose I wanted to visit the World Trade Center. Well I can’t it’s gone. So I say “I regret not having visited it while I have the chance.” Since there is no way in reality I can reverse this, the choice is meaningless.
If by magic I could make the Twin Towers reappear, does this mean I would immediately go into hock or whatever to get money to visit NYC and see them?
Would a woman who KNOWS she can’t get pregnant and says she regrets it, still feel that way if she COULD get pregnant? It’s easy to say something when you know it can’t happen.
Did these women who say they regret it, try to adopt? Did they think of artifical means like surrogacy or whatever?
As Archie Bunker said “It’s easy to be generous when it ain’t costing you nothing.”
To parapharase that, “It’s easy to say something when you know you’ll never be called on to prove your point.”
Damn you Zoe, elective plastic surgery that was the zinger I wanted to throw Justin_Bailey’s way :).
Plus, what kind of half-assed reason is “you may regret it” in the first place ? Would a sports medicine practician refuse me a certificate of good health on the grounds that Scuba diving is dangerous and trust me, you may regret that bill of clean health later when you get decompression sickness ?
Or, to put it in another context, would it be OK if your voting rights were suspended because you might regret voting for that guy later ? For that matter, think about all the decisions you’ve made that you later came to regret, would it have been OK at the time for a third party to deny you the option ? Of course not.
Bottomline is : it’s her damn decision, good or bad. If she comes to regret it later, there’s lots of kids need adoption.