A young mother came to a family planning clinic asking to go back on the Pill. She admitted that before the pregnancy she had often forgotten to take the Pills for two or three days at a time. The doctor, who normally listens well, found herself giving a lecture about the importance of regular Pill [...]
Before referral it is important for patients to know and to be able to have some say in the sort of therapist that they would like to see. It is pointless referring a man with impotence to a marital therapist if he wants to see a urologist for physical investigations. The referring doctor needs to [...]
Some patients hope to be supplied with contraception almost by remote control: they attend with several small children and multiple complaints, slipping in a request for ‘and can I have some Pills while I’m here?‘ The exhausted doctor, trying to stop the children from wrecking the surgery and smearing their sticky hands over everything within [...]
A young plumber sought advice at a counselling clinic soon after the failure of his marriage. He complained of marked premature ejaculation and he blamed this for the breakdown of his marriage, and for the failure of several previous relationships. He had requested vasectomy in the belief that this would solve his disorder. He was [...]
Consultations with patients from Third World countries are not the only ones to pose cultural problems, as has already been suggested. However, there is a particular difficulty when considering contraception and Third World countries, for the questions of world population and poverty are widely debated, and in discussion of these factors they are generally accepted [...]