Weill Cornell Medical College says Dr. Poppas’s clitoroplasties are "standard clinical procedure"

[edenfalling]

Back in June, there was a thing about Dix P. Poppas, a doctor at Weill Cornell Medical College, performing elective clitoroplasties (clitoris reduction surgery) on girls too young to give their own permission for the procedure, and then doing yearly checkups that involved him touching their genitals with a Q-tip or a vibrator to see if they had suffered any loss of sensation. Details of Poppas's actions are at this link.

I don't know what proportion of his surgeries were performed on minors as opposed to adults, nor the average age of said minors, but the point remains that at least some childhood surgeries happened -- and are presumably still happening. A man touching a young girl's thighs, labia, and clitoris, while she is aware of his presence and his power over her body, and asking her to tell him how the contact feels -- and please remember that these touches are, whether explicitly stated or not, a test of the girl's ability to feel sexual stimulation -- is, you must admit, skeevy as fucking hell, whatever your opinion of clitoris reduction surgery.

Anyway, WCMC released a statement on Monday affirming that the clitoroplasties and the skeevy follow-up are standard clinical procedures. Also on Monday, there was a panel discussion about the issue at Cornell. Further details about the statement and panel can be found at the Cornell Daily Sun, which ran the story as their cover piece today.

Warning: the attitude of Dr. Ralph Nachman, quoted in the article, may offend readers.

Comments

[willowgreen.livejournal.com]

Ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew!!

[edenfalling]

That was pretty much my reaction. :-(

[vehrec.livejournal.com]

Yeah, this is not cool. The entire reason he was doing the operations to begin with is strange as all get out-are we to circumcise and reduce the size of all boys with larger than average penii? And while follow up procedures are all well and good since one should never assume medical success, they seem to me to have been bungled baddly in this case.

So, why the hell is Nachman defending Poppas? Oh, yes, because they work for the same organization. Damn circling the wagons.

[edenfalling]

If adult women want to have clitoroplasties, that's one thing -- people should have control of their own bodies, however they want to modify them. But this kind of non-medically-necessary surgery on minors, just to make them fit current ideas of "normal," makes me uneasy at best.

It's like Nachman was uneasy about the skeeviness until he heard the magic words "standard clinical procedure" at which point he turned his brain and conscience off. Just because something is currently a standard procedure doesn't mean it should be one!