Narrative Matters: On Our Reading List

Editor’s Note: “Narrative Matters: On Our Reading List” is a monthly roundup where we share some of the most compelling health care narratives driving the news and conversation in recent weeks. The Egg Taboo Even with advancements in nearly every aspect of fertility and conception, there still remains a taboo around women using donor eggs to conceive, writes Amy Klein in her personal essay for Aeon, “Is That My Baby?” Klein had detailed her own journey with infertility on The New York Times’ Motherlode blog; now, using anonymous donor eggs, she was finally able to carry a pregnancy to term. Klein notes that egg donation is the only thing that remains a secret in these “uber-confessional days.” Of the options within “third-party reproduction,” where an individual outside the primary relationship helps create the baby, egg donation falls “lower on the totem pole” than either sperm donation or surrogacy. But as more babies are born with the help of this reproductive technology—of the over 60,000 babies born in 2013 through in vitro fertilization, nearly 10,000 were from donor eggs—Klein believes the stigma is likely to change. “I believe that such decisions are personal, and that any option—including a life that is child-free—can be full of joy,” she writes. The Other Feeding Option As an obstetrician, Maliha Sayla recommended breastfeeding to countless patients, but she was at a loss when it came to her own two children, neith...
Source: Health Affairs Blog - Category: Health Management Authors: Tags: Drugs and Medical Technology Equity and Disparities Health Professionals Narrative Matters Population Health Quality addiction breastfeeding fertility heroin Nurses On Our Reading List prescriptions Source Type: blogs