Medically assisted reproduction: Paradox, ethics, and destiny

Abstract

This is a comparative study concerning the relation between the psychoanalytic clinic and the physician, referring to whom both serve, the paradox derived from their epistemological grounds, and the fate given to this paradox. We contextualize the discourses of the clinical field of reproductive medicine in Brazil, in particular the regulatory text on reproduction practices with donated materials and two criticisms arising from the legal sphere. In the first section, the comparison between clinical methods considers that, despite the sharing of common epistemological grounds, clinics conceive the logic of functioning of the one to whom they direct their practice in different ways. However, the current regulation of Medically Assisted Reproduction clinical practices in Brazil exposes a paradox pertaining to the process of parental affiliation, which implies different medical and psychoanalytical epistemological bases, affecting their practices. In the second part of the article, we compare the different destinations resulting from this paradox.