pediatrician pulled back foreskin

firelight79 · November 2012

My son is uncircumcised and it was my husband who noticed that his new pediatrician, who he has been seeing since he turned 1, bc his regular doctor left the practice retracted the foreskin. My husband is also uncircumcised and he knows its a no no. I saw him do it yesterday but i don't know enough facts to tell the doctor, who should be the one to know these things, um are you sure you should do that? We may divorce him after this visit if my insurance allows we have very very very few options in our area based from insurance Up until recently this was the only practice on our plan. I was curious if anyone else's dr has done this and if they've called them on it what the dr said. Or is the dr not fully retracting it and just checking something? I don't want to tell the dr what he should be doing w/o having all the facts. Thanks!

poppy33 · November 2012

Our doctor has never even tried to do this. She checks his testicles and penis, but doesn't move the foreskin at all. It's intimidating to question a doctor (in my opinion), but I've done it and asked for something different and they obliged. And see if you have any other options for pedis if he insists. Good luck.

diana.filipi · November 2012

My pedi always checks DS. I took him yesterday for his 9 month and while she was checking him out she was like "OH, look, I wasn't expecting that!" His foreskin has already released. The head of the penis was there and looked just fine. It's a no no especially for an untrained parent but a pedi will check and knows to stop before there's tearing.

ETA: So, to be clear, it's not like magic that on the 2nd birthday the foreskin detaches and can be retracted. It happens sometime, often closer to 2. It's important to know when it's come to pass so that you can begin teaching your son genital hygiene. My pedi said every once in a while, since DS is still so young, that I should just check him out and gently pull back the foreskin in the bath. Just water is great and it's all good. He was clean and fine even though no one had ever pulled his skin back and cleaned him.

katie4253 · November 2012

Our pedi checked it for the first time at 18 months and it almost gave be a heart attack. However, I asked H what he thought about it (since he was holding ds) and he said, "She was just checking to see if had released yet. She didn't force it." I guess it isn't uncommon for it to release early and if it does you have to start pulling it back and cleaning it.

MammaBear81 · November 2012

Our pedi has never "pulled" it back, but has gentle moved it to see "where it's at" in terms of retracting. There is such a wide range of when it is able to be retracted that they "check" when he goes (they didn't start checking until 1year though). I have two older boys, and the oldest retracted super early (like 18 months) and #2 happened around 2 /2. DS3 is almost 18 months and he is nowhere near starting to retract.

I've heard it can take up until they are 10 years old to fully retract, but I haven't "read up" all that much because my kids haven't been in that boat.

SunnyMuffin · November 2012

Yeah.. at this stage the pediatrician doesn't need to be "checking" for anything by pulling back on his foreskin. The only concern I could see is them wanting to make sure his urethra is at the tip of his penis (a problem called hypospadias) but that would have been present at birth.

Its totally unnecessary to be checking for retractibility of the foreskin at this age. Some boys arent even fully retractibile until puberty.

I would probably try to avoid conflict by telling the dr hes wrong & not to do it, and try to find a different one as well.

Want a personalized experience?

pediatrician pulled back foreskin

Re: pediatrician pulled back foreskin

Choose Another Board

Search Boards