Circumcision

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I am writing a paper on circumcision and the response of the baby during and afterward. Does any body know any good web sites to find articles and resources. I would alos like to know your opinion about circumcision.

Search for circumsion on this page, there was a thread that had a zillion responses!

Specializes in NICU.

Hi,

This is by no means an exhaustive list, but it should get you started. I would highly recommend the first two sites; lots of interesting information. Good luck!

Ps. Some of these are not exactly impartial sources; it seems that there is a growing backlash against circumcision these days. It should give you a place to start, though.

http://www.cirp.org

http://www.noirc.org

http://www.circumcision.org

http://faculty.washington.edu/gcd/CIRCUMCISION/

http://www.edae.gr/circumcision.html

This one is a position statement from the American Academy of Pediatrics:

http://www.aap.org/mrt/factscir.htm

You wanted our personal opinions as well, correct? Well, mine is that I see little to no medical or hygienic reason to circumcise a male infant. If I were a mother, I don't feel that I personally would be able to subject them to such a thing. I don't see anything wrong with having an intact foreskin, and I feel that the risks involved in the procedure, as well as the amount of desensitization that takes place, are not worth the end result, which is simply a cleaner 'appearance'. My husband, however, when queried, disagreed with me. While he feels that he did lose a certain amount of sensitivity due to his circumcision, he felt that as a young male child, in the bathroom or locker room or whatnot, he would have been extremely uncomfortable when naturally comparing his own anatomy to that of his own father or other boys/men. In nursing school, I got to witness four circumcisions in the newborn nursery, and left the procedure feelign pain for the babies who were subjected to it. Many doctors routinely forgo anesthesia, and the only circumcision that wasn't painful for me to watch, and seemed somewhat less painful for the baby, was one in which the doctor employed the use of an anesthetic cream called EMLA. Just some thoughts. Good luck with your paper!;)

I think that the url above should be http://www.nocirc.org

We also chose not to circumcise our son. With more than half of boys not being circ'd today, there shouldn't be any more of the "locker room" excuses to do it. ;) As for the "not looking like dad" thing, when I asked my husband how often he compared his member with his father's, that excuse also fell by the wayside.

Krista

When our first son was born, we were in a military hospital. They gave a class to all the mothers who gave birth to boys, in which they (I can't remember exactly who it was.) described how they went about doing the circumcision.

It sounded horrible and I wasn't about to subject my son to that! To put a "bell" over the head of his member, pull the foreskin up and around it, and tie a string around the foreskin (tightly) and leave it there until the skin fell off. Now, I don't know if that's the way it was done every where else, but there was no way! Our boys are now 21, 19 and 13, and none are circumcised and all are healthy.

I still wouldn't want it done. My husband isn't done either, and there's nothing wrong with him by any means!;)

Julie:)

I have a little boy who is 1 today and last year when he was born we didn't get him circumcised. I researched it over the course of my pregnancy and decided I didn't want to subject my baby boy to that. The day he was born my roomates (in hospital) baby got circumcised and I was so glad my son didn't have to go!! There are many baby boys now that are not getting circumcised. That was what we chose and I have not regretted it.

Suzanne

We had our son circumcised. My husband didn't feel comfortable with having to explain to him later in life why he looked different than our son, nor did he know how to teach him to look after it. My husband also had three uncles who had to have it done in their thirties and they were in a great deal of pain. I do not regret having him circed. My husband made the final decision, and I agreed with him. It really wasn't hard to decide when my huband explained his point of view. Our son never even cried when he had it done as an infant. I think if you are going to have a son circumsised that it should be done in infancy, they'll never remember it.

Personally, I think this is one of those decisions that is personal, and people (both parents) should do what they think is best and not be persuaded by talk of it being painful, or just because someone else is trying to persuade them one way or another. (incidently, I fell the same way about Breast vs. Bottle)

My sister who had a boy just before ours was born said to me "How could you put your baby through that?" I never even gave it another thought, I did what I thought was best for our son, just like she chose not to, which she felt was best for her son.

This is only my opinion, and I would never balk at someone who chose to do it differently.

Originally posted by Sonja

Personally, I think this is one of those decisions that is personal, and people (both parents) should do what they think is best and not be persuaded by talk of it being painful, or just because someone else is trying to persuade them one way or another. (incidently, I fell the same way about Breast vs. Bottle)

I'm not going to start a debate here, but I wholeheartedly disagree (on both of the issues you bring up). These aren't "personal" issues, they are health issues, and parents should think about what is best for the health of the child, not just themselves.

My $.02 :)

Krista

Specializes in NICU.

Thanks, Krista, for the correction. Typos. ;>)

I only have a daughter so far and we chose NOT to have her circumcised. LOL..

At first I agreed with the side of not doing male circs because of what I've read in research studies and the discomfort to the infant. While living in Europe where few circs are done I have seen a large number of children end up being circed at around age 3-5. Mostly due to trouble toilet training and from infections from poor cleaning. I always thought it was a myth at first. I have also seen a couple phimosis' and they are very nasty. These children who were circ'd at a later age needed general anesthesia and were very sore for about 2 weeks - which would have been much better to have been done at birth. The good side is that this doesn't happen to everyone.

Benefits of not having a circ include no discomfort, bleeding and risk of infection at birth and several studies mention that circ'd memberes lose anywhere from 20-40% of sexual endurance especially in the early teen years. The loss of skin increases stimulation and premature ejaculation especially if condoms are not used. Downside of not having a circ may include initial difficulty with toilet training. There is also a need to ensure your child is cleaning well behind the foreskin.

It is a cosmetic surgery (with little medical benefit). I mention all these aspects and let them decide. I feel it is a personal choice. Most places charge $300. We do it free so our circ rate is about 90-95%. If they say no all the better- less work to do.

I do not like the plastibell where there is that awful plastic thing hanging on the member for about 10 days. Give them a finished product with a moghan or Gomco (gomco is tedious to do).

Jared

Hello All and I do hope that this doesn't upset you but, seeing your topic reminded me of a joke.

This cosmetic surgeon would keep the foreskins and his colleague's asked him why? He said that since items were made from the skins of other animals that possibly he could make something too. They laughed and he became more determined to make something with them and told them too return in two weeks.

Two weeks went by and they all gathered in his office awaiting his presentation of what he'd made. Soon he appeared and held up his hand, firmly grasping a wallet made from the foreskins.

"Thats it, a wallet?", they queried. He said yea but if you rub it, it becomes a briefcase!

Actually, there was a study done regarding the risk/benefit tradeoff of circumcision. It compared the incidence of complications of circumcision with the incidence of UTIs (most common GU problem) and penile cancer (least common GU problem) in both circumcised and uncircumcised men. The number of study subjects was around 6,000. What they found was that for every complication of circumcision that had to be endured, 6 UTIs were prevented. For every 2 complications, 1 case of penile cancer was prevented. Complications included postop bleeding, infection, urethral injury etc, not just major irreparable stuff. I don't have the url now, but I'll see if I can find it.

I'd like it better if I hadn't had to have a part of my son removed at birth too, but I know so many guys who had to have it done later in life that I didn't ever want him to have to go through that. When it's done later, it's not just that it is so much more serious, but it can cause psych problems too (mini-castration, almost..)

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