Adoption: New Tasks for the Pediatrician
Roy C. Haberkern MD1
1 Chief, Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Bowman Gray School of Medicine, Winston-Salem, NC, and member of American Academy of Pediatrics, Committee on Early Childhood, Adoption, and Dependent Care
Adoption involves an excess of 2,500,000 American children younger than 21 years of age and, thus, directly affects approximately 2% of American families. It profoundly touches the lives of those involved. For the pregnant, unmarried woman it offers hope for better nurture and security for her child than she may be able to provide. For the adopting couple, it offers an opportunity to love and care for a child as their own. For the adopted child, it offers a chance to have a family that is presumably able to meet his or her needs for love, guidance, and stability.
Pediatricians have provided services in different areas of the adoption process for many years. They may be asked for guidance by teenage patients who are pregnant but feel unable to care for the child themselves. Pediatricians are consulted by couples or adoption agencies to examine a child prior to adoption to assess specific problems and needs for services. They are asked for advice and assistance by families that include adopted children who find that they need help with difficulties that may or may not be specifically related to the adoption. Their help is sought by adoptees struggling with identity issues, problems in their relationships with members of their adoptive families or with others, concerns about obtaining medical information about themselves or their biologic families, or questions about attempting to establish contact with their families of origin.
