Question about baby check up

[catholic74]

I stopped my midwife from attempting to retract my son's penis. She said something about checking the hole inside, the one he pee's out of. At the time, I said, "Well, he's peeing plenty so it works. No need to check it" or something to that effect. When I mentioned it at a well baby visist at our local hospital, the ped said my midwife probably wanted to check that my son's pee hole was in the proper place, meaning that it might be too far up or to the side, etc. She also said that when someone says not to retract the penis, that means not to push it past the head of the penis. She said pushing it just a little in order to check the very tip (the pee hole) is not retracting and that doing that is ok. I did not allow her to because I was skeptical, but I would like to know if she is correct? Anyone have any information on these issues?

p.s. Even if his hole were in an incorrect position, what would be done about it? Would they do surgery and if so, wouldn't they wait until he's older anyway?

[Claire and Boys]

afaik, what she is doing is still retraction and a no-no. It can still cause micro tears and intoduce infection. If your son had hypospadias bad enough to require treatment, it would be noticeable by the appearance on the foreskin outside without needing to retract him. like you said he is peeing fine so why would they need to investigate in there?

[paquerette]

Retraction is any manipulation of the foreskin towards the body, so they were incorrect there. Huge, common misperception, unfortunately.

And yes, if there was any deformity severe enough to warrant immediate attention, it would be obvious on the outside. Very rarely is immediate surgery recommended; usually it's much better to wait until he's through puberty and reevaluate then in the case of hypospadius.

It's probably worth gathering some information and giving it to your doctor and midwife. It would help so many other boys besides your son. :

PS, the term for the pee hole is meatus.

[phdmama06]

Ditto the other posters. Retraction is any manipulation of the foreskin, even just pushing it back a little bit to look at the meatus.

If he were to have hypospadias (meatus being in a different place than usual), it may involve surgical correction, it may not, depending on the degree of severity. If it needed surgery, the condition would be obvious without having to do any retraction at all.

[catholic74]

Thanks for educating me, particularly on the proper name for "pee hole" lol I was wondering.....

[blsilva]

You were right, mama. Good instincts!

[MCatLvrMom2A&X]

Check out the sticky The Definition of Retraction & Why it is BAD!!! on the main page. Even a little movement is retraction and not needed at all.

[jessjgh1]

We are going through this with our pedi too. I wanted to find out his view, before I recommended him to other parents-- my son's past the point of concern, but I'm stil not sure I want to switch to the new doctor.

The problem is the pedi says that the aap guidelines state such... that the gentle retraction to view the meatus is 'necessary'.
I'm still trying to find that on the aap website.... but I"m having problems although I vaguely remember reading something similar in a section about well-child exams-- this was a LONG time ago when I was looking at the AAP site for other information.
I disagree that it is necessary and believe it can be potentially damaging, even if the doctor tries to be careful but, if the aap is still saying this, doctors are going to feel justified in doing it-- indeed like they 'need to'.

Jessica

[MCatLvrMom2A&X]

It isnt on the AAP site it is on a pediatric site. I dont have the link with me here but it is a major problem because peds are reading those instructions