title: Are there morally relevant differences between hymen restoration and bloodless treatment for Jehovah's Witnesses?
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Hymen reconstruction is a controversial measure performed to help young females under threat of honour-related violence. Official guidelines often reject offering hymen reconstructions. On the other hand, extraordinary measures in order to enable operations of Jehovah's Witnesses who want a bloodless operation in order to avoid religiously related sanctions are often considered praiseworthy. The aim is thus to examine whether or not there are relevant differences between these two measures.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  We identified twelve potential differences. One difference could be considered relevant (patient-safety), but in favour of hymenoplastic operations.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Since we did not identify enough relevant differences to justify offering bloodless operations to Jehovah's Witnesses but not offering hymen reconstruction due to honour-related norms, we conclude that these two groups of patients should be treated equally. This means that neither of the patient groups should be offered these extraordinary operations or that both groups of patients should be offered such operations. Similarly, there are no reasons for judging those who perform the operations differently.
authors.affiliation: Stockholm Centre for Healthcare Ethics, Karolinska Institutet, LIME, 171 77 Stockholm, Sweden. niklas.juth@ki.se.
authors.forename: Niklas
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Juth
authors.forename: Niels
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Lynøe
mesh_terms: D016063:Blood Loss, Surgical; D001803:Blood Transfusion; D003466:Cultural Characteristics; D005191:Family Characteristics; D005260:Female; D013509:Gynecologic Surgical Procedures / Q000941:ethics*; D006801:Humans; D006924:Hymen / Q000601:surgery*; D007514:Islam; D033221:Jehovah's Witnesses; D008297:Male; D033242:Minors; D010358:Patient Participation; D061214:Patient Safety; D026684:Personal Autonomy; D019651:Plastic Surgery Procedures / Q000941:ethics*; D012068:Religion and Medicine; D012746:Sexual Abstinence; D012945:Social Values; D014754:Violence