Confidentiality

Worried the Receptionist at the Surgery, who lives next door will tell your Mum about something that's happened to you at the Surgery? Or that the Doc's going to mention something about you to your Mum when she's next in- well, DON'T WORRY, 'cos it ain't going to happen.

It's all TOTALLY CONFIDENTIAL. Your Mum, Dad, or whoever will never know. If a Nurse, or Doctor, or ANYONE else at the Surgery, breathed a word about it to anyone else without your say so, that would be it- they'd be struck off, sacked, never work again.

What the law says about consent.

If you've had your 16th birthday, no problem, you count as an adult- no problem with consent

If you're under 16 years, we've got to make all reasonable efforts to persuade you to tell one or other of your parents yourself- we would never do it ourselves (unless, let's say, you're unconscious and you need emergency treatment to save your life like yesterday). But if it looks to us like you're going to do something anyway- and the most common thing we're talking about here is having sex- the law says we can sort you out for contraception without your parents knowing.

SO FORGET ABOUT YOUR PARENTS FINDING OUT FROM US - THEY WON'T

A tip though- what we see time and time again is that parents get to find out somehow- they find an empty Pill pack in the dustbin, or an ex-boyfriend tells his big sister who tells your auntie who works in the same place- you know the story. Well, when they find out, the s*** hits the fan bigtime! On the other hand, what we've found, time and time again, is that girls who decide to let their Mum or Dad know- well, their family realises that their daughter has grown up, and they accept that their daughter's made a wise and mature decision. After all, you can bet they're not going to be keen to have to start looking after (and paying for) a little baby again!