At some point during last month's well-baby checkup for her son Isaac, Kamila McGinnis stopped listening to her pediatrician.
Isaac, who turns 3 in June, hasn't shown much interest in toilet training. McGinnis wants him out of diapers and encourages him to use the potty. But, she says, her pediatrician told her to back off.
"She said, 'He'll know when it's the right time for him,' that it's important to let him do it on his own," says McGinnis, the mother of three in Timonium, Maryland. "In the back of my mind, I said to myself, 'I disagree.' I felt like my pediatrician was saying she knew more than I did."
In many ways, pediatricians do know more than parents. When your doctor says your newborn needs to ride in a rear-facing car seat, don't argue. When he says your 2-month-old with a 105-degree fever needs to get to the doctor's office -- and fast -- you'd better listen.
But there are far more areas that are gray and have no science, or not very good science, to back them up, says our panel of pediatric experts. They say that sometimes, this means your pediatrician is giving you his or her opinion, not medical fact. 
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Elizabeth Cohen is a correspondent with CNN Medical News.
