Providing accessible medical abortion services in a Victorian rural community: A description and audit of service delivery and contraception follow up

Abstract

Objective: To describe how a nurse led, MToP service is run in primary care in regional Victoria and investigate the characteristics and contraceptive choices of the women who have attended.

Study design: Descriptive study of the development and implementation of a rural MToP service and a retrospective chart audit of patients attending between January 2015 and September 2016.

Main outcome measures: Characteristics and clinical outcomes for women attending an MToP service in a primary care setting in rural Victoria. Contraceptive usage pre and post attending a rural service for MToP.

Results: There were 229 presentations, representing 223 women, of which 172 women (75.1%; 95%CI: 69.0%, 80.6%) had a successful MToP and for two further women, MToP failed, requiring a surgical termination (0.9%; 95%CI: 0.1%, 3.1%). At the time of presentation, the mean age of women was 25 years, the median length of gestation was 49 days and 171 (75%) had not had a previous termination. Data about contraceptive use was available for 195 women, 143 (73.3%) reported no contraception, 2 reported emergency contraceptive pill (1.0%), 10 used condoms (2.1%) and 39 (20.0%) reported hormonal contraception. Among the 156 women using no contraception, condoms or emergency contraception at the time of pregnancy, 113 (72.4%) initiated a reliable form of contraception post presentation to the MToP service.

Conclusion: Provision of accessible, affordable MToP through an integrated primary health service is one strategy to address access inequity in regional areas.

Keywords: Medical termination; Primary care; Rural.