TY - JOUR T1 - Female genital mutilation in children presenting to Australian paediatricians JF - Archives of Disease in Childhood JO - Arch Dis Child SP - 509 LP - 515 DO - 10.1136/archdischild-2016-311540 VL - 102 IS - 6 AU - Yvonne Zurynski AU - Amy Phu AU - Premala Sureshkumar AU - Sarah Cherian AU - Marie Deverell AU - Elizabeth J Elliott Y1 - 2017/06/01 UR - http://adc.bmj.com/content/102/6/509.abstract N2 - Objective The WHO reports that female genital mutilation/cutting (FGM/C) is an ancient cultural practice prevalent in many countries. FGM/C has been reported among women resident in Australia. Our paper provides the first description of FGM/C in Australian children.Design Cross-sectional survey conducted in April–June 2014.Setting Paediatricians and other child health specialists recruited through the Australian Paediatric Surveillance Unit were asked to report children aged <18 years with FGM/C seen in the last 5 years, and to provide data for demographics, FGM/C type, complications and referral for each case.Participants Of 1311 eligible paediatricians/child health specialists, 1003 (76.5%) responded.Results Twenty-three (2.3%) respondents had seen 59 children with FGM/C and provided detailed data for 31. Most (89.7%) were identified during refugee screening and were born in Africa. Three (10.3%) were born in Australia: two had FGM/C in Australia and one in Indonesia. All parents were born overseas, mainly Africa (98.1%). Ten children had WHO FGM/C type I, five type II, five type III and six type IV. Complications in eight children included recurrent genitourinary infections, menstrual, sexual, fertility and psychological problems. Nineteen children (82.6%) were referred to obstetrics/gynaecology: 16 (69.9%) to social work and 13 (56.5%) to child protection.Conclusions This study confirms that FGM/C is seen in paediatric clinical practice within Australia. Paediatricians need cultural awareness, education and resources to help them identify children with FGM/C and/or at risk of FGM/C, to enable appropriate referral and counselling of children, families and communities to assist in the prevention of this practice. ER -