Vignette 2

One day a businessman came to see me. I had not met him before. He wanted me to destroy some notes. He and his wife had experienced infertility. His notes showed he had a low sperm count. After some time, his wife had undergone artificial insemination and got pregnant. He now had a daughter of about 6 or 8 years old.

He loved his daughter more than he could say. He wanted me to destroy any evidence that he was not her father.

At this time I had not had any particular training in medical ethics and the law, and was not sure what to do.

His concern was that his daughter should never learn that he was not her ‘real’ parent. It seemed likely that he had not got over his infertility. Loving his daughter more and more seemed to make it worse.

We did not have any counsellors then, so he got me, in what was probably a ‘10-minute' consultation.’ This is in quotation marks as we added ‘fit-ins’ on top of the 10-minute scheduled bookings as they came.

I told him what I felt about his unresolved grief.

He still wanted the records destroyed.

I told him what was usual to say at the time, that the records were the property of the Secretary of State. In any case, what if there was some genetic problem in the future? His daughter might need to have these records available to her.

He went away. I think he still wanted the records destroyed.

I did not see him again.

• © British Journal of General Practice, 2004.