INFERTILITY AND THE CONTRACEPTIVE CONSULTATION – SMEAR
Nowadays, with a national cervical screening programme in place, someone like Mrs H. may not manage to avoid a smear for so long, but she would certainly have managed to find some effective way of keeping both doctors and her husband away from her emotional fears surrounding intercourse until she wanted a baby: if not away from the actual physical examination, as had happened here. The patient has to want some changes to be made before treatment can begin to be effective, but Mrs H. could not acknowledge her own desire to have intercourse and all that it might mean for her. However, now it was for a baby she felt that it was a suitably acceptable reason to approach her doctor about such an uncomfortable topic.
It took Mr and Mrs H. almost a year to achieve intercourse and there followed 18 months of infertility before the psychosexual doctor met them again, this time in the infertility clinic. Mrs H. had changed into a confident woman compared with the little girl that had appeared originally. A simple ovulation induction regime proved successful and they now have a healthy young son.
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