Dear All:
I want to make it clear that I actually tried to help the client who got so pissed off at the 
pediatrician try to understand why a pediatrician might think the way her daughter's pediatician 
did in a futile effort to assuage her anger.  This particular pediatrician is much older, probably 
went to medical school during the days when few women managed to even get into medical 
school and probably was highly accomplished in her day.  I don't know whether she had children, 
but if she did have children, she probably was given very little slack in terms of managing her time 
with them.  However, when I think of all the misguided advice that is given out about 
breastfeeding I think the huge difference between her garnering this mother's wrath was that she 
didn't listen, not that she gave advice that was flawed.  My son's pediatrician gives some terrible 
advice about breastfeeding.  What keeps me from harboring deep resentment towards him is that 
he admits to me that he doesn't know that much.  What has probably kept him from lawsuits is 
that he talks to his patients and admits the limits of what is known.  When I had a mother who lost 
one of her two babies and was stewing about it, my son's pediatrician openly discussed with me 
some of his tough cases when a baby had died.  What helped the parents was he immediately 
called them and talked frankly with them and discussed and listened to all of their feelings. In our 
litigenous US society this is a hard thing to do sometimes, but ultimately I think it is a better 
appraoch.  

This pediatrician so angered my client not because she was a bad pediatrician per se, but because 
she was so arrogant that she thought she didn't need to listen to her client.  I can't see either the 
book that spoofs the Upper East SIde Manhattan parents or the New York magazine article as 
offering anything constructive.

Susan Burger

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