Dr. Patricia Hoffman

Commentary by Susan Brinkmann, OCDS

A disgruntled patient is crying foul after receiving a letter from her Ob-Gyn informing her that, due to her Catholic faith, she will no longer be writing prescriptions for chemical birth control.

The Daily Mail is reporting on a dust up between a 31 year-old patient named Leslie Gauthier and her doctor, Patricia Hoffman, MD, of Allegiance Family Health in Jackson, Michigan, who sent letters to her birth control patients informing them that as a Catholic physician, she will no longer be prescribing contraception. She explained that continuing to do so would put her in a position of cooperating and promoting something that violates her religious beliefs.

“I realize that patients also use birth control pills for other non-contraceptive conditions such as acne and painful periods. I will work to use alternative medications instead of prescribing birth control pills to treat such conditions. So I will not be prescribing birth control pills for non-contraceptive reasons either,” Dr. Hoffman said in her letter.

“I will be happy to continue providing your medical care, and if you request, I am always willing to inform patients about how to use natural family planning instead of using artificial birth control. However, if you choose to continue to use birth control pills or Depo-Provera injections for contraceptive or non-contraceptive reasons, you will need to see a different provider for your annual gynecology exam [sic].”

Gauthier was furious and slammed Dr. Hoffman on her Facebook page. “This is basically my doctor refusing to do her job because of her religion. I am shaking I am so upset. This is a doctor and person I trusted for years and she has failed me. There's an easy solution, I'll find someone in that office willing to put aside their beliefs to do their job. But I feel so hurt by this wrong being done based on her personal beliefs. [sic]”

She later told Cosmopolitan that she had been seeing Dr. Hoffman for five years and it was never a problem before and even drove out of her way to see the doctor when she moved further away.

“I've been taking birth control for non-contraceptive reasons in some form or another since I was 13 years old. So she knows it's not fully for contraceptive reasons.”

Gauthier also admitted to feeling judged and found support from her mom, a “devout Catholic”, who also found Dr. Hoffman's change of policy “ridiculous”.

“I don't have five different partners a year - and even if I did, that is not her business,” Leslie said. “She's basically denying me a basic health care right to women ... she's using her personal belief to take something very personal away from me.”

Allegiance Health issued a statement supporting the doctor. "We respect and accommodate the rights of our providers to observe their religious beliefs. Regarding a provider decision to prescribe or not prescribe contraceptives, we ensure the provider advises the patient of alternative arrangements, including the option to choose another provider."

Dr. Hoffman is acting in accordance with the Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services which states that “For legitimate reasons of responsible parenthood, married couples may limit the number of their children by natural means. The Church cannot approve contraceptive interventions that ‘either in anticipation of the marital act, or in its accomplishment or in the development of its natural consequences, have the purpose, whether as an end or a means, to render procreation impossible.’ Such interventions violate ‘the inseparable connection, willed by God . . . between the two meanings of the conjugal act: the unitive and procreative meaning’.”

Because she has not chosen to comment about her decision, there is no way of knowing exactly why Dr. Hoffman decided to stop dispensing these drugs except that doing so was no longer comfortable for her.

Gauthier should respect that position rather than attacking her with the typical feminist talking points about women having a “right” to services such as abortion, contraceptive, sterilization, etc. If women have the right to embrace these medical procedures, they also have the right to refuse them – for whatever reason – not just for reasons that Gauthier agrees with.

It should also be pointed out that Dr. Hoffman is doing Gauthier an enormous favor by discontinuing to dispense drugs that are known carcinogens and which are currently posing serious health risks to millions of unsuspecting women. Thousands have been seriously injuried by pills such as Yaz ,Yasmin and Ocella as well as devices such as Essure and Nuva Ring. Gauthier should be thanking her former doctor for sparing her from the injuries that have prompted thousands of lawsuits against the manufacturers of these products.

If Gauthier did a little homework, she would realize that Dr. Hoffman was offering advice that could one day save her life.

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