At the back stage of prenatal care: Japanese Ob-Gyns negotiating prenatal diagnosis

Med Anthropol Q. 2006 Dec;20(4):441-68. doi: 10.1525/maq.2006.20.4.441.

Abstract

In this article, I explore the reluctance of Japanese ob-gyns to discuss prenatal diagnosis (PND) tests with pregnant women. The analysis focuses on the culturally specific ways in which ob-gyns formulate their cautiousness and criticism toward PND while invoking a local moral economy. Analyzing ob-gyns' accounts, I show how the ambiguities of PND are constituted in a specific moment in Japanese culture, history, disability politics, and national reproductive policies and are formulated through local paradigms of thinking about pregnant women, their fetuses, and the process of becoming a person in Japanese society. Finally, I show how PND in Japan is pushed to a "back-stage" realm in which the diagnosis for fetal anomalies is practiced in secrecy.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Amniocentesis
  • Female
  • Humans
  • Japan
  • Maternal Age
  • Physician-Patient Relations*
  • Pregnancy
  • Prenatal Care
  • Prenatal Diagnosis / methods
  • Prenatal Diagnosis / psychology*