Medical Child Abuse: How the State Revokes Parental Rights

August 11, 2015 Abuse and Neglect Attorney

For parents who handle mental, behavioral and developmental disorders in their children, daily life can be very challenging. Navigating the complexities of varying diagnoses and treatment options is often extremely stressful and very time consuming. But now, to make matters worse, those same parents are being confronted with a new and terrifying reality – medical child abuse.

 
Imagine yourself as the parent of a child with a stupefying medical condition. One doctor says that your child has psychological disorders, and wants to treat with selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors. But another doctor says it’s the rare and commonly misdiagnosed PANS disease, and recommends anti-inflammatories and immunosuppressants.

 
As parents who believe that you know your child, and would only do what you believe is best for them, you choose to go with the doctor whose diagnosis sounds right. Feels right. But suddenly CPS is on your doorstep, accusing you of medical child abuse, and the court has decided that you are no longer fit to parent your child. You are terrified and confused. You never neglected your child’s health, or did anything to compromise their healing process. So why are you being treated like a criminal?

 
Unfortunately, we have reached a point in our society where a great many doctors put such stock in their own opinions, that they cannot accept that a lay person would disagree with them. It is much easier to simply report the parent for medical child abuse, than admit that their diagnosis may have been wrong.

 
Additionally, there is so much uproar about child abuse in the media nowadays, it has colored the perspective of many in the medical profession. It would seem more likely to a doctor that any parent refusing his opinion is more prone to be a child abuser, than a concerned parent exercising their right to choose what they believe is best for their child.

 
The number of parents who have found themselves having to hire attorneys and fight, sometimes for years, simply in order make medical decisions that other parents take for granted is growing. The decision to choose one doctor’s opinion over another. The decision to pursue one course of treatment in favor of others.

 
What makes this even harder for many parents in these situations, is that they are not guilty of the presumed “rogue doctoring” they are accused of. If you choose one doctor’s advice over another, the treatment plan your child ends up with is still one that was prescribed by a doctor. Not by a parent who thinks they know best. So it’s almost a case of damned if you do, and damned if you don’t.

 
Frightening and nerve-wracking as the prospect of a medical child abuse accusation may be, it is entirely possible to protect your family, and your right to parent your children. We are experts at defending falsely accused parents, and restoring your family’s peace and privacy. If you or a loved one have been falsely accused of medically abusing a child, contact us immediately. We can help you through this difficult time.