Talking with parents before newborn screening

Abstract

Parents typically make all sorts of decisions about their children's health care. 1 Hickson G.B. Clayton E.W. Parents and their children's doctors. in: Bornstein M.H. Handbook of parenting. 2nd edition. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Mahwah, NJ2002: 439-462 Google Scholar They decide when to provide care themselves or to seek help and guidance. They decide whether to follow the clinician's advice about child-rearing, medications, and tests. Efforts are rarely made, either by clinicians or by the state, to override parents' decisions. There are a lot of reasons for this relatively deferential stance toward parents. Some are quite practical, even utilitarian. Clinicians recognize that parents, who almost always initiate the contact, will not come as readily when they fear they are going to be overruled. Parents are usually in the room when children are poked, prodded, and stuck, and it would be odd not to say something about what is going on and why. Further, parents are less likely to adhere to recommendations when they do not understand them or feel that they were treated rudely. Many clinicians believe that empowering patients and parents to take a greater role in their health care leads to better outcomes. Other reasons for deferring to parents reflect an evolving ethical understanding of the foundations of medical care. Health care decisions often reflect values that vary in socially acceptable ways among individuals. The relatively recent notion that patients, and in the case of children, their parents, have a role to play in their health care reflects a commitment to honoring the values of patients, who are, after all, the ones primarily affected by health care choices.