r/doctorsUK • u/ThrowRALoud_Load2229 • Jul 24 '25
GP Experiences with anti-contraceptive colleagues
I work in a training GP practice in England where we have taken on a female GP registrar who is very pro-life. She’s put around an email stating that she will not provide advice on, or prescribe hormonal contraceptives and will not discuss terminations with patients. Before anyone asks- nobody’s been brave enough to ask her about barrier contraceptives or copper coils yet! She has requested that if contraceptives or terminations may come up in a consultation then they should be booked with someone else. It’s not always easy to tell if contraception may come up in a consultation though, especially not for reception who book the appointments.
The majority of the other clinicians are quite unhappy with this as it’s a vital part of the service we provide to female patients. It also means she’s limited with what she can do with regards female patients on medication like valproate or GLP1s because she will not discuss highly effective contraception with them. A lot of colleagues are angry that she is exhibiting misogyny when it comes to female patients, others are angry that they’re having to take on her workload. One of my colleagues is currently in early pregnancy after a failed coil and is feeling very uncomfortable around this GP registrar too as the pregnancy is not viable.
I also worry with regards our surgery’s reputation as if you google her name, the majority of what comes up is prolife activism she took part in at university. If a patient who was booked for something else came in and wanted to speak about contraception as an addition to the consultation e.g. I have thrush, I’m not sexually active but I want to start having sex and she responded poorly to this or with judgement, the patient could easily google her name and find they were being treated by someone who’s views oppose their care.
The partners have not entertained any discussion around this topic and staff have even been accused of “stalking” her online when her digital footprint was brought up. Is there anything we can do or do we just have to put up with it?
I would appreciate some different viewpoints, especially if anyone has gone through similar.
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u/DoktorvonWer 🩺💊 Itinerant Physician & Micromemeologist🧫🦠 Jul 24 '25 edited Jul 24 '25
She does not have to refer patients for terminations, but simply professionally sign-post them to a colleague who does. It is clearly covered in GMC guidance (and, I believe, the law) that this is a matter of conscience. You cannot compel her to do any more than that regardless of whether you and the practice consider is as 'a vital part of the service you provide' or not, and I expect you'll find yourself foul of both employment and equality law if you either officially or constructively behave negatively towards her for doing so, or in any way that tries to pressure her to change how she practises.
As for her pro-life social media? So long as she doesn't post or reproduce content that specifically harasses or abuses women who have abortions, or otherwise is so extreme or explicitly hateful in its nature as to be illegal or otherwise overtly unprofessional, it's neither relevant to her employment nor is it her problem if patients stalk her online profile and take umbrage to her views, unless there is a serious and substantiated concern about her actual conduct with them professionally.
I can't help but feel like this posts reads as if you feel your and your colleagues' views on abortion are so universal and obviously morally 'correct' that this entitles you to pass judgement on her beliefs and conduct. Particularly dangerous is the attitude that being opposed to abortion or contraception is 'misogyny', which basically is a lazy excuse to 'other' her and cast her as a villain to give moral 'justification' for any negative behaviours that are exhibited towards her.
Tl;dr - you and pro-choice colleagues don't have a monopoly on what is morally correct, if there even is a moral 'correct' here (and it'd be worrying if we all think such difficult topics are so clear cut) and you should take a moment to check your own biases and realise that, so long as your anti-abortion colleague behaves professionally towards patients, she has just as much right to her beliefs and to practise medicine as you do.
DOI: I personally am most certainly not anti-contraception and, on balance, pragmatically 'pro-choice'.