The thing about the foster system is that it's extremely overloaded: while it might not be ideal for a former treating doctor to foster the teenage girl, there's not going to be foster parents knocking down the door to take her. It would be better if the doctor is from the emergency room rather than the psych ward (so there has already been a termination of the physician-patient relationship when the paperwork begins) but again, not impossible either way.
Just another detail - if your doctor lives in an extended family, all the adults have to be police checked for a foster child to live there, and any adult who would be responsible for her care must do the foster parent training. Unless doctors' working hours are very different in your universe, I would expect at least one other person to have done that training.
Disclaimer: this is how it would work in one state, in the US.
In some cases, at the first court hearing, which would be when the facts get presented to a judge on whether there's grounds for her to be brought into agency custody, an adult who has formed some kind of relationship with the teen could present themselves (to the agency first, or to the judge) as an option for emergency foster care.
The judge would probably ask the agency to do a fast background check and home inspection, but would have the authority to sanction the doctor as an emergency placement.
Without being licensed, with the classes, the fire inspection, the TB test, and all the other parts of being a "real" foster parent, the doctor couldn't get paid the foster parent stipend, but if they were willing to waive that, they could be a court-sanctioned placement without going through the full process.
The background check and home inspection would be a must, though, and the judge would want to know why the doctor and the teen wanted this.
While this is true, I think it makes sense to take existing rules as a jumping off point. And I'd be fascinated to see how such rules accommodated the extended family thing.
But such rules are so rooted in ideas about the family that there is no reason at all to base them on "here".
An example: in the 1890s US fostering was disapproved of because it brought in foreign blood to the family (children were distributed across the west in the orphan trains as semi-servants, not true family members). This attitude was maintained by the Catholic Church in Ireland until the 1970s.
Through the 19th century single women were seen as better choices for girls than married women because of the fear of immorality with in situ boys.
And a ps: the Shakers collapsed precisely because of a change of attitude to fostering. They had been seen as the best possible choice and took in thousands of orphans. Then suddenly they were seen as "unnatural".
Would it be possible for the doctor's family to already be part of the fostering system? That way the background checks, etc., would already be done and the process could go more quickly.
Unless the doctor is already a licensed foster parent, nope. The class is about 30 hours, then there's the paperwork and monthly trainings and some other things you have to do to maintain your license.
If you want to use artistic license you could have a social worker in the hospital recommend an 'emergency placement' which basically speeds the licensing process up and in the meantime keep the teen in group care or a respite home (the latter of which are basically short term foster homes designed specifically for this kind of situation). It would still be at least a few days (I could easily see a week going by) before she could move in, but it's still light years ahead of what it is normally.
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Just another detail - if your doctor lives in an extended family, all the adults have to be police checked for a foster child to live there, and any adult who would be responsible for her care must do the foster parent training. Unless doctors' working hours are very different in your universe, I would expect at least one other person to have done that training.
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In some cases, at the first court hearing, which would be when the facts get presented to a judge on whether there's grounds for her to be brought into agency custody, an adult who has formed some kind of relationship with the teen could present themselves (to the agency first, or to the judge) as an option for emergency foster care.
The judge would probably ask the agency to do a fast background check and home inspection, but would have the authority to sanction the doctor as an emergency placement.
Without being licensed, with the classes, the fire inspection, the TB test, and all the other parts of being a "real" foster parent, the doctor couldn't get paid the foster parent stipend, but if they were willing to waive that, they could be a court-sanctioned placement without going through the full process.
The background check and home inspection would be a must, though, and the judge would want to know why the doctor and the teen wanted this.
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An example: in the 1890s US fostering was disapproved of because it brought in foreign blood to the family (children were distributed across the west in the orphan trains as semi-servants, not true family members). This attitude was maintained by the Catholic Church in Ireland until the 1970s.
Through the 19th century single women were seen as better choices for girls than married women because of the fear of immorality with in situ boys.
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If you want to use artistic license you could have a social worker in the hospital recommend an 'emergency placement' which basically speeds the licensing process up and in the meantime keep the teen in group care or a respite home (the latter of which are basically short term foster homes designed specifically for this kind of situation). It would still be at least a few days (I could easily see a week going by) before she could move in, but it's still light years ahead of what it is normally.
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