Bioethical Analysis of Sexual Reorientation Interventions

Abstract

The efficacy, consequences and ethical principles surrounding sexual reorientation therapies provided by health professionals has been debated in the public, professional and academic arenas since the first interventions were offered. This thesis applies a model for problem solving in bioethics to the issues raised by this debate. This in depth exploration of the facts and fictions surrounding the provision of sexual reorientation interventions through the critical lens of bioethics will be useful to those patients, health professionals, and health policy makers who struggle to make sense of a highly political health care issue. Sexual reorientation is fraught with conflicting moral and ethical implications that impact the patient and the health professional on many levels. Bioethics is used to bring some clarity to a complex and contentious problem.

About the Author

Travis K. Svensson, MD, MPH, PhD Assistant Clinical Professor of Psychiatry University of California San Francisco