USA – Abortion bans complicate medical training, risk worsening OB/GYN shortages

Thousands of doctors-in-training have lost access to abortion training. Some are fleeing to other states.

By Sara Hutchinson, Washington Post
October 13, 2023

SIOUX FALLS, S.D. — The journey to Boston was more than 1,500 miles. The plane ticket cost about $500. The hotel: another $400. Amrita Bhagia felt a little guilty about going, knowing that not everyone could afford this trip. But it was important; she was headed there to learn.

So Bhagia, a second-year medical student from Sioux Falls, S.D., caught that flight to Boston to attend a weekend workshop hosted by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists. There, she joined medical students from around the country for a summit on abortion care. She learned about medication abortion, practiced the technique of vacuum aspiration using papayas as a stand-in for a uterus, and sat in on a workshop about physicians’ rights.

Continued: https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2023/10/13/obgyn-training-abortion-restrictions/

States With Abortion Bans Are Losing a Generation of Ob-Gyns

Half of US counties have no ob-gyn, and post-Roe laws prevent new doctors from getting required training. It's only going to get worse

BY MARYN MCKENNA
JUN 20, 2023

SHIRA FISHBACH, A newly graduated physician, was sitting in an orientation session for her first year of medical residency when her phone started blowing up. It was June 24, 2022, and the US Supreme Court had just handed down its decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, nullifying the national right to abortion and turning control back to state governments.

Fishbach was in Michigan, where an abortion ban enacted in 1931 instantly came into effect. That law made administering an abortion a felony punishable by four years in prison, with no exceptions for rape or incest. It was a chilling moment: Her residency is in obstetrics and gynecology, and she viewed mastering abortion procedures as essential to her training.

Continued: https://www.wired.com/story/states-with-abortion-bans-are-losing-a-generation-of-ob-gyns/

The Disastrous Potential of the Texas Abortion-Pill Ruling

A nationwide ban on mifepristone would further erode doctors’ ability to provide—or learn how to provide—lifesaving care.

By Isaac Chotiner
April 11, 2023

Last week, two federal judges issued conflicting rulings on the abortion drug mifepristone, setting the stage for a clash that is likely to end up in the Supreme Court. First, a judge in Texas ruled that mifepristone would be banned nationwide in seven days. Then, a judge in Washington ordered the F.D.A. not to make any changes to the availability of the drug, which the agency approved for use more than two decades ago and which has an extensive safety record. While the legal process unfolds, abortion providers and health professionals are caught in limbo, exacerbating the challenges they have faced since last year’s Dobbs decision.

I recently spoke by phone with Jody Steinauer, the director of the Bixby Center for Global Reproductive Health at the University of California, San Francisco, to better understand how abortion care changed after Dobbs and what a ban on mifepristone would mean for women’s health care. Our conversation, edited for length and clarity, is below.

Continued: https://www.newyorker.com/news/q-and-a/the-disastrous-potential-of-the-texas-abortion-pill-ruling

11.04.2023

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USA – Medical students worry about where to train as several states enact abortion restrictions

By James Pollard, Associated Press
Oct 19, 2022

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — Students in obstetrics-gynecology and family medicine — two of the most popular medical residencies — face tough choices about where to advance their training in a landscape where legal access to abortion varies from state to state.

Abortions are typically performed by OB-GYNs or family doctors, and training generally involves observing and assisting in the procedure, often in outpatient clinics. Many doctors and students now worry about nonexistent or subpar training in states where clinics closed or abortion laws were otherwise tightened after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.

Continued: https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/medical-students-worry-about-where-to-train-as-several-states-enact-abortion-restrictions

After Dobbs, U.S. medical students head abroad for abortion training no longer provided by their schools

By Olivia Goldhill
Oct. 18, 2022

A fourth-year medical student, Tema, faced an abrupt interruption to her education earlier this year. A state law banning abortion after six weeks went into effect hours after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, and two days later, the clinic where her school provided first-hand abortion experience shut down.

“I’d do my patients a great disservice if I’m not trained in abortion,” said Tema, who is planning to become a family planning doctor, and asked that she be identified only by her first name for fear of repercussions by her medical school. “I’m going into a career where I care about reproductive health, I need to understand all aspects of it.” Without help from the school, Tema had to find an alternative herself, and will travel abroad next month to observe abortions being performed in a clinic in London.

Continued: https://www.statnews.com/2022/10/18/medical-students-heading-abroad-for-abortion-training/

Abortion Bans Are Limiting What Some Doctors and Med Students Are Taught

The shortage of abortion providers is expected to worsen, post-Roe

By Ella Ceron
10 July 2022

Abortion care is one of the most common medical procedures in the US, yet even before the fall of Roe v. Wade, doctors and students had to navigate tricky legal and educational hurdles to train as abortion providers. With last month’s Supreme Court decision freeing states to ban abortions, those barriers are growing.

Some abortion advocates are warning that recent moves could aggravate the nationwide shortage of trained abortion providers, making the procedure scarcer — even in blue states that are acting to guarantee access — than first thought.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-07-10/abortion-bans-are-limiting-what-some-doctors-and-med-students-are-taught

Many Residents Won’t Get Abortion Training if Roe Is Overturned

45% of OB-GYN Residency Programs Are in States Where Abortion is Likely to Be Banned

April 28, 2022
By Laura Kurtzman

Nearly half of obstetrics and gynecology residency programs in the U.S. may lack abortion training if Roe v. Wade is overturned in an upcoming Supreme Court decision, according to a new study by UC San Francisco and UCLA.

Researchers mapped OB-GYN residency programs across the U.S. and highlighted those in the 26 states that are expected to ban abortion if the Supreme Court overturns Roe in its ruling on Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which is expected by the end of June.

https://www.ucsf.edu/news/2022/04/422741/many-residents-wont-get-abortion-training-if-roe-overturned

28.04.2022

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USA – Amid abortion rights threat, OB-GYNs more vocal with support

The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists has been defending abortion in recent lawsuits challenging state restrictions

By TRAVIS LOLLER, Associated Press
8 March 2022

NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- As the Supreme Court mulls whether to uphold Mississippi’s 15-week abortion ban, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists filed a brief against the state law, calling it “fundamentally at odds with the provision of safe and essential healthcare.”

But the organization’s support for abortion hasn’t always been unequivocal. After the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision guaranteed the right to abortion, American OB-GYNs remained divided on the issue. Many declined to perform elective abortions either out of moral opposition or because they wanted to avoid the “butcher” stigma that still clung to abortion doctors from the pre-Roe days.

Continued: https://abcnews.go.com/Health/wireStory/amid-abortion-rights-threat-ob-gyns-vocal-support-83319403

Even Texas Allows Abortions to Protect a Woman’s Life. Or Does It?

Sept. 12, 2021
By Carole Joffe and Jody Steinauer

Join us, if you will, in a thought experiment. It’s the
fall of 2022. Dr. H., an obstetrician-gynecologist, practices in a red state.
Much has changed in the reproductive rights landscape by then: In the spring,
her state rushed to pass a law similar to the notorious 2021 Texas law that
bans a large majority of abortions and incentivizes private citizens to sue
anyone helping someone get an abortion. The Supreme Court also overturned Roe
v. Wade in the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization case that year,
leaving the issue of abortion regulation to individual states; a few years
before, Dr. H.’s state passed a trigger ban that automatically banned the few
abortions that were still legal in the state when Roe fell. In her state, the
law now allows an abortion only when a pregnancy threatens the life of a
pregnant person.

Continued: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/12/opinion/abortion-texas-roe.html

USA – Want to Protect the Right to Abortion? Train More People to Perform Them

Want to Protect the Right to Abortion? Train More People to Perform Them

By Jody Steinauer
Aug. 29, 2018

When I was in medical school in the 1990s, it was rare to hear abortion mentioned as an option for pregnant women at all — let alone for there to be in-depth training on how to counsel patients on a full range of pregnancy options, including termination. My generation of physicians simply wasn’t prepared to provide basic, comprehensive reproductive health care. Even though it had been 20 years since Roe v. Wade legalized abortion nationwide, only 12 percent of obstetrics and gynecology residency programs at the time included abortion training.

Twenty-five years later, the training situation has, fortunately, improved. But there is still work to do: More than a third of ob-gyn residency programs don’t offer routine abortion training. Some programs offer training only on treating someone who is managing a miscarriage, so those residents do not gain skills in counseling and caring for women who want to end their pregnancies. Most family medicine residency programs still have no abortion training at all, even though family physicians are critical for providing high-quality family planning within primary care services.

Continued: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/29/opinion/abortion-provider-training-roe.html