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Did you get your son circumcised?
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Anonymous
| We did not. DS is 3 weeks old. After doing a bunch of research we decided it was an unnecessary medical procedure. OB also was against it, but that did not factor into our decision. |
Anonymous
| Yes. Didn't seem to hurt anymore than vaccine shots. Believe in health benefits. |
Anonymous
Both are unnescessary 99% of the time. Medical reasons, how would you know when the kid is an infant? But thanks for being an ass. |
Anonymous
| Evidence doesn't support it, whether you "believe" there are medical benefits or not. But, there are important cultural issues at play that have different weight for different families. No such pressure in our family, so no go. |
Anonymous
Agreed! I have a feeling pp does not vaccinate after the "it hurts" comment. |
Anonymous
| Our pediatrician at the time saw no medical reason (for or against) and so we did not circumcize as we did not have any religous beliefs that would require it. I really just have a hard time with permanently alterning someone else's body without their permission. But that's just me. |
Anonymous
| there is a HUGE difference between having it done at the hospital and having it done with a mohel. It seems barbaric in a hospital. we did ours with a mohel because we're Jewish, but non-Jews can use mohels as well. My son was given a quick injection to numb his penis. When the circ was done, it took all of 5 seconds and he didn't cry. Breastfed him afterwards and he was fine. Healed in one week with no problems. |
Anonymous
|
I don't know what people are talking about concerning deaths. See below. The only way I can conceive of it is if a doctor used a non-sterile instrument, the baby got an infection, and the parents ignored it and never brought the baby back into the doctor. Rather like getting a girl's ears pierced.
Dr Tom Wiswell, a respected authority in the USA was a strong opponent, but then switched camps as a result of his own research findings and the findings of others. This is what he has to say: "As a pediatrician and neonatologist, I am a child advocate and try to do what is best for children. For many years I was an outspoken opponent of circumcision ... I have gradually changed my opinion" [Wiswell, 1988; Wiswell, 1992]. This ability to keep an open mind on the issue and to make a sound judgement on the balance of all available information is to his credit ... he did change his mind! Wiswell looked at the complication rates of having or not having circumcision performed in a study of 136,000 boys born in US army hospitals between 1980 and 1985. 100,000 were circumcised and 193 (0.19%) had complications, mostly minor, with no deaths, but of the 36,000 who were not circumcised the problems were more than ten-times higher and there were 2 deaths [Wiswell & Hachey, 1993]. A study by others found that of the 11,000 circumcisions performed at New York's Sloane Hospital in 1989, only 6 led to complications, none of which were fatal [Russell, 1993]. An early survey saw only one death amongst 566,483 baby boys circumcised in New York between 1939 and 1951 [National, 2003]. There are no deaths today from medical circumcisions in developed countries. Very similar to the study by Wiswell above, it was found that of 354,297 infants born in Washington State from 1987-96, only 0.20% had a complication arising from their circumcision, i.e., 1 in every 476 circumcisions [Christakis et al., 2000]. Most of these ‘complications’ were minor and readily treated. It was concluded that 6 urinary tract infections could be prevented for every circumcision complication, and 2 complications can be expected for every penile cancer prevented [Christakis et al., 2000]. Problems involving the penis are encountered relatively frequently in pediatric practice [Langer & Coplen, 1998]. A retrospective study of boys aged 4 months to 12 years found uncircumcised boys exhibited significantly greater frequency of penile problems (14% vs 6%; P < 0.001) and medical visits for penile problems (10% vs 5%; P < 0.05) compared with those who were circumcised. |
Anonymous
Ever heard of the WHO? http://www.who.int/hiv/topics/malecircumcision/en/index.html How about the NIH? http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/circumcision.html You can disagree with them, but I have no reason to believe some ignorant anonymous poster over what the World Health Organization or National Institutes of Health states. Oh...but they don't count, right? |
Anonymous
|
To 15:55, my OB and ped confirmed this risk of death. This article puts it at "Death is rare, and mortality risk has been estimated to be 1/500,000 procedures. (10)"
http://www.aafp.org/online/en/home/clinical/clinicalrecs/guidelines/Circumcison.html This is the American Academy of Family Physicians, not an anti-circ group. If a baby develops sepsis for any reason, you have very little time to save the baby. |
Anonymous
| those studies are old. more current studies show that many of the "problems" uncirced boys run into are the result of ignorant care providers treatment of uncirced penises. i.e. advice to manually retract the foreskin for cleaning (!!!! ouch). Not the current practice, and it's only changed recently. |
Anonymous
The WHO is not making recommendations for children born in the United States. Circumcision makes more sense in countries with higher HIV rates. |
Anonymous
| the WHO study is based on WORLDWIDE populations. In my family's demographic the benefits of circumcision are bascially non-existent....we're talking about the reduced risk of STDs right? Well, our son is going to learn to wrap it up...not something that is all that common in certain parts of the world or in certain cultural groups. It's an individal decision that should be based on individual circumstances. |
Anonymous
| Didn't do it, but everyone with little boys who I know well enough to ask did. Just didn't seem right to me to cut off a perfectly fine body part and potentially introduce problems that otherwise would not exist. |
Anonymous
|
WHO and NIH are pretty good sources. And, by the way, DC has relatively high rates of HIV - especially among nonwhite populations. Maybe you're white and figure your son would never have sex with an HIV positive black man or woman.
No one is saying circumcision is mandatory. Just that it is fine and has benefits. |