DesirousofChange, I understand what it is that you are saying.
However, the starting position of the attitude that "doctors are more careful" when there isn't blood, is what I am challenging.
Saying such a statement doesn't take into account the reality of the situation.
Consider it from this use of an "illustration". (haha!)
Think of the surgical experience as an act where the surgeon and his medical team are being asked to walk on a tightrope across a deep ravine, holding the patient. In the surgery, the blood is the safety net under that tightrope. By refusing blood, the patient is not forcing the doctors "to be more careful", they are putting extreme pressure on the team to do their job...without a safety net.
That "extra carefulness" is just a weasel phrase for "create extreme anxiety in the medical team".
What sticks in my craw about that statement - "doctors are more careful" - is that doctors (good ones...there are 'bad' doctors...) are always careful. With or without blood. Without blood, they are being asked to perform a procedure without a vital tool in their toolkit.
And the JWs lap it up - they are led to believe that they are "special", that they are "elite" and that their refusal of blood (a safety net across that ravine that the doctors have to walk) is what will force the doctors to perform better...just because they are JWs who refuse to let the doctors do their job with the tools they have available. It is this misguided notion that the patient can force the doctor to perform better by simply taking his safety net away.
Yup...here ya go, doc...take that patient across that ravine...but don't look down, there isn't anything between you and that dark chasm that yawns below your feet.
Sure....that will make the doctor be "more careful."
