Was surgery OK?

There is a lot of controversy over this article about this boy with autism and his parent’s decision to operate on him to stop a behavior. I think you have to look at it from all different perspectives to say what is acceptable because there is a fine line between right and wrong. Many people’s first instinct is to say this is not okay and be extremely mad about it, however in this particular case I think the surgery was okay on this boy. The family had tried every other option they could think of to help him. He would scream as loud as a lawn mower over one thousand times a day. The surgery was also reversible which is the main reason I’m okay with it. This is a big reason because if it did not help or made it worse then they could fix it.

 If there were no other options and there was no other way to stop this behavior it is considered acceptable to me. In the article they said they had looked for a trigger and had looked for other ways to get him to stop but nothing was helping. It might have made him upset to make that noise and drove him to make it even more.

 It would be a tremendous strain on the family to have that noise one thousand times a day every day for years on end. It also mentions that the twin brother was negatively affected by it. This could have been a huge hassle with them not being able to take him anywhere. It probably annoyed the neighbors and even the family.  This might have been the only way they could keep him in the house and him with the family.

 My main reason for accepting it is that it is a reversible procedure because if it harmed him more than helped him it can be fixed. If the surgery does not help it can be changed back to the way it was. If it ever had a negative consequence then it could be changed back to how it was before the surgery and they could try another option they might not have thought of.

I fear that in other cases where surgery might not be necessary procedures like this will be used. This is a very thin line people are walking on when dealing with people with disabilities. This is a very hot topic for parents who have kids with IDD. If you can do surgeries on them for behaviors in extreme cases now it could gradually become less and less severe to where they would operate. This could become a very bad thing if not monitored carefully. I am glad people are very careful and try all other options before they even consider surgery.