The clinical subject: adolescents in a cleft-palate clinic

The paper examines the format and some interactional dilemmas of outpatient consultations in a clinic for cleft lip and palate. Three problems are addressed. First, the adolescent patient's status as a 'consumer' is problematic: it is ambiguous whether they can be entrusted with decision-making on their own behalf. Second, there is the problematic status of parents' rights. Third, the policy implications of these problems are raised in relation to the conduct of 'child-centered' medicine. It is suggested that socializing the clinic may reinforce, rather than undercut, professional dominance.