What’s Wrong with This Picture? Uterus Transplants.

I heard on NPR yesterday that a hospital in New York has been conducting research and is close to being able to offer uterus transplants to women who want to bear children. You can listen to the story on NPR’s Day to Day by clicking here. You can read about the research here. Here’s some more on the subject from the AP via The Spokesman Review in Washington. Need a little satire with your news? Try this, from The Spoof, in the UK. Gotta love them Brits!

Uterus transplants. That’s right. Not lungs, which are necessary to breathe. Not kidneys, which are necessary to process and excrete fluids and minerals. Not a heart, which is, of course, the ultimate transplantable necessity. No, a uterus. Harvested from a woman who was unlucky enough to be killed while of childbearing age.

In case you hadn’t heard, having or using a uterus is not necessary for life. It’s not even, truly, necessary for a fulfilling life.

C’mon, folks. We are so obsessed with having (i.e. “bearing”) our own children that we will go through major abdominal surgery (we’re not talking about a laporoscopic procedure here) and treatment with immunosuppresant drugs for the sole purpose of being able to say we bore our own child?

How much attention is being paid to the impact of those immunosuppressives on a developing fetus? More importantly, why expose a child to any kind of risk associated with that therapy if it’s really not necessary?

Reproductive science has developed some marvelous therapies…first artificial imsemination then in vitro fertilization. We can now screen for a large number of genetic disorders early enough in pregnancy to allow parents the choice to bear a child with Trisomy 18 or cystic fibrosis. We can implant the ovum and egg from one couple into a woman’s body and successfully cultivate a pregnancy to a healthy conclusion.

Why is it so imperative for a woman to actively, personally participate in the incubation and delivery process to reach fulfilment in parenthood?

The basic immorality of this doesn’t even address the fact that this therapy will probably be out of the reach of all but the wealthiest infertile couples. The working poor infertile couple who has no health insurance will just have to go without. Or they can do what we’ve done for centuries…take in a family member’s child, adopt…

This seems the ultimate folly and vanity to me. If we want to outlaw some procedures, instead of focusing on embryonic stem cell (using cells which will be destroyed anyway) why not focus on something really needless, like transplanting uteri?

On my other site…

…I posted the following. Since I thought is was so chock-full of the useful information I try to pass on to my patients, I thought I’d post it here, as my first, official Snarky Harpy at WordPress entry.

With no further ado, I present:

Dear “Tooth Abscess Keflex”

You stopped by this site on Saturday or Sunday using those words as your search term.

I hope you had some fun while you were here but I doubt you found the answer to your query.

Disclaimer: The following information is given for its anecdotal value only and is not meant to be perceived as offering medical advice or practicing my profession. In other words, I’m warning you to take this at your own risk and, if you get fucked up as a result and think about suing my fucking ass, you can kiss my rosy ass.

Anyway, “tooth abscess keflex,” I have learned in my experience as an ER nurse that the large majority of physicians I’ve worked with like to prescribe Keflex for skin wounds. Apparently, it covers a lot of the bacteria that regularly colonize the skin.

For dental problems, they usually prescribe a penicillin, usually Pen-Vee K. If Pen-Vee K doesn’t do the trick, they usually move to Clindamycin. I’ve seen my oral surgeon do just that when I had a mandibular cellulitis last summer. Unfortunately, Clindamycin is a very potent antibiotic which can nearly sterilize the gut, so developing Clostridium difficile following a course of Clinda is a distinct possibility if your bowel contains c. diff.

If you are a woman, any of the ‘cillin’s can interfere with hormonal contraceptives. If you use the pill, patch, Depo, etc, you’ll need to use barrier contraceptives (condom or diaphragm) for the duration of the therapy. I would continue until my next cycle, or at least for three extra days, just to be safe.

For prevention of c. diff. and the vaginal yeast infections many women suffer during or following a course of antibiotics, eat a yogurt every day (with active cultures) or get some acidophilus pearls/pills from a health-food store and use as directed. The refrigerated kind of acidophilus works best. I’d continue with the yogurt or acidophilus for 2 or 3 days after the antibiotics, a minimum of 7 days following a course of a long-acting abtibiotic like Rocephin or Zithromax.

The only cure for dental issues is to see a dentist / dental clinic and have the work done. Go see a dentist!

If you show up to my ER once, I will tell you that personally.

If you present yourself to me on two or more occasions with the same complaint, I will yell at you.

 

I promise.

 

**Read the Disclaimer, for God’s sake**

 

Post imported from Claiming my Inner Bitch on WordPress, because that’s where the search term led.