• Awoo [she/her]@hexbear.net
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    27 days ago

    Dr. Erica Li, a pediatrician who supports Heywood’s measure to block trans girls from girls’ teams, acknowledged that sports physicals don’t currently require sex verification.

    But she noted that other types of exams do, such as annual pediatrician checkups

    America is fucking weird. You have pediatricians that fiddle with kids bits once a year and that’s supposedly normal? Where the fuck is this happening and why haven’t I heard of it before?

    • Inui [comrade/them]@hexbear.net
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      27 days ago

      It’s things like checking for testicular cancer/anomalies, worms, etc. I’d be surprised if other countries don’t do that.

      • Awoo [she/her]@hexbear.net
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        27 days ago

        Not normal over here at all. If you’ve got a problem and report that problem then sure, you can see a doctor and have a checkup. But annual checkups that include a genital inspection without an actual reason? Completely unnecessary. In fact, annual checkups aren’t a thing here either. If you tried to book in “I just want a check up” any UK surgery is going to respond with “Ok what for? What are your symptoms?”

        I’m genuinely being culture-shocked by this shit. It’s weird as fuck because it’s totally unnecessary.

        • Sam [none/use name]@hexbear.net
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          27 days ago

          NHS doctors don’t do annual physicals because they barely have time to do direct treatment to seriously engage in preventive measures like that. Go look at private doctors in the UK though and you will find that they all offer these services.

        • purpleworm [none/use name]@hexbear.net
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          27 days ago

          In fact, annual checkups aren’t a thing here either.

          Maybe start there, because checkups are part of preventative care and much better for public health than waiting to go to the doctor only when something is clearly wrong. I don’t have any particularly strong opinion on how checking testicles is handled and if another method would be better, but in the most general terms yes it does make sense to have a medical expert check there (and other places where it’s very easy to check for symptoms of severe conditions, e.g. lymph node swelling, which can be in the genitals but also other areas) rather than exclusively rely on the child and parents who are notably not medical experts (though of course they are also given instruction on checking and reporting).

          • Awoo [she/her]@hexbear.net
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            27 days ago

            If that were true then there would be evidence that stopping them decades ago had a negative impact, but it did not.

            • purpleworm [none/use name]@hexbear.net
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              27 days ago

              I’m confused why something like that could just be flatly asserted. There are lots of articles you can find about underdiagnosis in the UK of conditions that things like generalized regular checks make an effort to find. Aside from the public health topic in a more general sense, could you explain about annual checkups being stopped decades ago? I’d be interested to learn about the history there but I’m having a hard time finding it because I’m pretty bad at this sort of thing.

        • Guamer [she/her]@hexbear.net
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          27 days ago

          side thing, but exclusively going to the doctor when an overt symptom emerges can be bad, as stuff like cancer/diabetes/etc can go undetected and fester

    • PleasantPeasant [none/use name]@hexbear.net
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      27 days ago

      american. in my annual checkups there was never any “fiddling” with my genitals, doctor would just check for hernia by asking me to do that cough thing while pressing on my groin but there was no touching of genitals and i dont even remember ever having to pull my pants/underwear down far enough to where the doctor could even see my genitals