If no intervention is taken before the 120 th day of pregnancy the mother will be condemned to carry the anomalous foetus to term, which will be a futile and painful effort. All of these may be further compounded if the attending physician is (v) uninformed regarding the cultural norms of the patient. Other contributing factors include (iv) the lack of proper guidelines for the healthcare worker to undertake the early diagnosis of foetal anomalies and to adequately handle the TOP before the 120 th day of pregnancy appears to contribute to the severity of the problem. A review of the literature and anecdotal evidence suggest this predicament to be due to (i) a lack of knowledge on the part of parents, which is compounded by guilty consciousness (ii) a delay in the early and rapid diagnosis of foetal anomalies due to a flawed or inefficient referral system and (iii) the lack of expert clerical opinions. There is now a large volume of compelling empirical evidence indicating that considerable pain and suffering is experienced by the mothers of anomalous foetuses because they did not undergo TOP due to cultural reasons or because they were delayed and could not perform a TOP before the 120 th day of pregnancy. Both speed and a timely intervention are critical in the management of foetal anomalies in the Muslim patient. Delays in diagnosis have contributed to considerable suffering for both parents and the affected children. This is crucial because if a diagnosis is delayed for any reason, then TOP will become illegal if attempted past the 120 th day. Islam allows TOP under certain conditions if the pregnancy has not progressed beyond the 120 th day of pregnancy, which is also referred to as the day of ensoulment. In particular, it is crucial to be adequately acquainted with the norms of the major faiths of the world, especially when dealing with matters of a sensitive nature such as TOP. It is therefore crucial for healthcare workers to be sensitive to the norms of different cultures to be able to deal effectively with specific ethical issues. The inability of service providers to effectively handle sensitive issues such as the termination of pregnancy (TOP) can result in enormous prolonged suffering for both the parents and the affected children. Healthcare providers are oftentimes confronted with ethical issues regarding peoples of different cultures, the resolution of which differs from that of their own. The current unprecedented movement of people has re-distributed people of all faiths to almost every corner of the globe. Anomalous foetuses must be detected at the earliest possible time to enable an appropriate medical intervention prior to the 120 th day.Īpproximately one-fourth of all the inhabitants of the earth are Muslims. The authors recommend that an institutional committee governed and monitored by a national committee make decisions pertaining to abortion to ensure that ethics are preserved and mistakes are prevented. The authors urge Muslim law makers to also consider abortion post ensoulment if it is certain that the malformed foetus will decease soon after birth or will be severely malformed and physically and mentally incapacitated after birth to avoid substantial hardship that may continue for years for mothers and family members. Considerable variation in religious edicts exists, but most Islamic scholars agree that the termination of a pregnancy for foetal anomalies is allowed before ensoulment, after which abortion becomes totally forbidden, even in the presence of foetal abnormalities the exception being a risk to the mother’s life or confirmed intrauterine death. Islam is considerably liberal concerning abortion, which is dependent on (i) the threat of harm to mothers, (ii) the status of the pregnancy before or after ensoulment (on the 120 th day of gestation), and (iii) the presence of foetal anomalies that are incompatible with life. In Islam, and most religions, abortion is forbidden. Due to unprecedented migration, physicians are often confronted with cultures other than their own that adhere to different pdigms. Approximately one-fourth of all the inhabitants on earth are Muslims.

Sunni faqt board top people