Doctor-patient confidentiality apparently doesn't extend to TV doctors. Or at least, not to one in particular.
Britney Spears' family has lashed out at Dr. Phil McGraw for violating their trust by not only speaking so publicly—and frequently—to the media about his brief hospital meeting with the singer but by planning what was ultimately an ill-fated special about her plight.
Lou Taylor, the family's spokeswoman and a former business manager of Lynne and Jamie Lynn, appeared on The Today Show Wednesday to make the family's anger and disappointment over the betrayal known, as well as to clear up what part exactly they would have played in the scrapped Dr. Phil Now special—namely, none.
"What's wrong with Dr. Phil's statement is that he made a statement," Taylor said, referring to the pop psychologist's public diagnosis that Spears was "in dire need of medical and psychological intervention."
"The family basically extended an invitation of trust for him to come in as a resource to support them, not to go out and make public statements. Any statements publicly that he made, because he was brought in under this cloak of trust, are just inappropriate. We feel like, to set the record straight, we need to say that."
In previous statements made during his weekend media blitz, McGraw said he paid Spears a visit at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center Saturday morning, appearing just as she was being discharged, only at the request of the Spears family, whom he said contacted him for guidance roughly a year ago.
As for the highly touted special, Taylor did acknowledge that McGraw approached the Spears clan with his plan of an hourlong special devoted to the troubled singer, "but it was decided it would be detrimental for anybody to ever do that."
"They were not going to do a show...he was not invited to make this a public display or part of the media."
On a personal note, Taylor said she felt the request itself was a sort of betrayal and that it was "inappropriate for him to even be self-serving in bringing something like that up, because that would not be a vector in getting Britney help."
She also said McGraw's loose lips and handling of the aftermath of his brief visit has likely "compromised" the relationship between Britney and her mother and sister.
There's no word on whether the request was for permission to do the show or simply a blessing to do it, or whether the request was made of the Spears clan prior to his nonstop promotion of the would-be special, though on Monday morning, McGraw announced he had made the decision to cancel the episode "out of consideration" for the Spears family, as the situation with Britney was "too intense."
Taylor said the incident with the TV doctor was just another instance of the 26-year-old singer's inner circle falling prey to exploitation, a fear that reportedly continues in the wake of Spears' relationship with paparazzo Adnan Ghalib.
"Here you have Britney—that needs to have some security somewhere—that every single thing she does and every single person she has a relationship with doesn't become an opportunity to get exploited," Taylor said. "I mean, when do you ever rest in that if you're constantly in fear of being exploited?"
As for the Spears family, Taylor said they were completely "taken advantage of" and called Lynne, who remained in her hometown of Kentwood, Louisiana, with daughter Jamie Lynn throughout the ordeal, "a mother who is heartbroken just to be separated from her daughter."
She added that the two of them "were looking for support here, not to add to the trouble that is already upon them...They are people who love their daughter. Jamie Spears, Lynne Spears, Bryan and Jamie Lynn Spears are all amazing people."
As for the no doubt equally amazing Britney, new details have come to light, this time not courtesy of Dr. Phil, about last week's meltdown.
According to People, during the star's hours-long standoff with police officers Thursday night, the LAPD issued a temporary restraining order against the singer to keep her away from her children, after she locked herself in a room of her house with one-year-old Jayden James.
The emergency protective order, enforced for just five business days following its issue, was so ordered to "stabilize the situation," Kevin Federline's attorney, Mark Vincent Kaplan, told the magazine, though he declined to say who requested the order or whether he would seek to extend the request.
"Kevin doesn't want to keep his kids from being involved in [Spears'] life," he said. "But foremost is that the kids be in an environment of structure and stability. The next goal is to get things to a point where both parents are able to participate fully in their lives."
On Friday, Spears was temporarily stripped of all remaining custody and visitation rights. The next custody hearing is scheduled to take place Monday.