Signature Required: Doctors Advise. Parents Decide.

The clipboard slides across the counter. The pen is already uncapped. Sign here, initial there, and the line moves on before you have read a single word of what you just agreed to. Here is what no one tells you at that counter: you have far more say than they let on. The right to ask. The right to refuse. The right to a second opinion, to your child's records, to a religious exemption, and to a straight answer about what is actually required versus merely recommended. You did not lose those rights when you walked through the door. You were just never handed the list. SIGNATURE REQUIRED is that list. Written by a legislative strategist and mother who has spent years reading the fine print so you do not have to, it walks you through the real law, case by case and state by state, in plain English. No law degree and no medical degree required. It is not anti-doctor, and it is not built on fear. It is built on something steadier: knowing exactly where you stand, and how to stand there without ever raising your voice. Inside, you will learn how to: - Tell what is truly required from what is only recommended - Give informed consent, and informed refusal, the right way - Get and guard your child's medical records - Use a religious or conscience exemption without getting tripped up - Ask for a second opinion without burning a bridge - Be heard by a doctor instead of dismissed as an "anxious mother" - Read a frightening statistic without letting panic run the calculator - Hold your ground when a disagreement gets wrongly called neglect >The doctor advises. But the signature, and the decision behind it, was always yours. My kid. My call. Rebekah Ricks is an author and legislative strategist who has helped move more than forty bills into law across multiple states. She writes where policy and faith meet, from her kitchen table in Winter Haven, Florida.

Pages: 231, Paperback, Independently published