In the current political climate, abortion is an enormous topic of debate. Democrats and Republicans have been locked in many heated debates on pro-choice vs. pro-life, even becoming critical topics in recent presidential debates. Even further, there is a debate on whether or not abortion should be taught in medical school, as different medical schools take opposing sides to the matter. These decisions are the result of many interworking cogs: religion, politics, or in the case of the University of Arizona College of Medicine in the 1970s, an agreement to ban abortions in university facilities in exchange for $5.5 million to renovate their football stadium (Gordon, 2015). Insane. At this point you might be thinking, “wait a minute, isn’t this supposed to be a physiology blog?” Well yes, but as Dr. Campisi has said many times “if you don't think medicine and politics are intertwined you're wrong”.
Currently, publicly funded medical schools in multiple states (Arizona, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, and Texas) have restricted or even completely banned any abortions from happening in their facilities (Gordon, 2015). As a result of this, the number of clinicians who are able to perform abortions has decreased by 37% since 1982, with heavy concentration of those that do in large, more liberal cities (Gordon, 2015). In turn, this has created a huge gap in providers that are knowledgeable on abortion care in rural, and largely conservative cities. Further studies found 87% of all US counties have no abortion care providers available to women in need (Askel et al., 2013). Once again, politics has created a void where women who need basic care are either unable to get the care they need, or must travel to find a provider who can.
This issue is not only sequestered to the United States, as medical schools in the United Kingdom also lack proper abortion care training. For medical schools in the United Kingdom, only two half days spread three years apart are dedicated to abortion within the core curriculum. In year 2 of medical school, students have a half day on abortion in the context of medical ethics and law while in year 5 of medical school, students can opt-in to receiving clinical training of abortion care (Cohen et al., 2021). Additionally, it was found only 38% of UK medical schools even provide this opportunity for students to learn about the reasons patients want to receive abortions, and the appropriate way to clinically handle them in a respectful way (Oldroyd & Fialova, 2014). Medical students need these opportunities, especially future OBGYN and family practice doctors in order to correctly advise their patients in the future.
As aspiring physicians, it is our duty to inform our patients without disrupting their autonomy. Without proper knowledge of abortion practices, we are doing a disservice to our patients. One in every three women within the United Kingdom will have an abortion in their lifetime, and nearly one in every four American women will have an abortion in their lifetime (Cohen et al., 2021; Gordon, 2015). In my personal opinion, I think abortion care practices should be incorporated into medical school curriculum in effort to prevent spreading of misinformation to our future patients. Training on abortion care is essential for training our future doctors to allow this to happen, and it unfortunately all boils down to politics and who has the bigger checkbook. Or if your school wants a new stadium I guess. What do you think?
Aksel, S., Fein, L., Ketterer, E., Young, E., & Backus, L. (2013). Unintended consequences: abortion training in the years after Roe v Wade. American journal of public health, 103(3), 404-407.
Cohen, P., Mayhew, J., Gishen, F., Potts, H. W., Lohr, P. A., & Kavanagh, J. (2021). What should medical students be taught about abortion? An evaluation of student attitudes towards their abortion teaching and their future involvement in abortion care. BMC medical education, 21(1), 1-7.
Gordon, M. (2015). The scarcity of abortion training in America’s Medical Schools. The Atlantic.
Oldroyd, C., & Fialova, L. (2014). Ethics teaching on ‘Beginning of Life’ issues in UK medical schools. Journal of Medical Ethics, 40(12), 849-853.
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