Abstract : Adolescents who choose abortion are more likely than adult women to delay seeking services once they know they are pregnant. They also are more likely to resort to unskilled providers and dangerous methods. When complications result from an abortion, adolescents tend to delay seeking treatment and, consequently, often present at health facilities with serious and life-threatening complications. What is the experience of young women who have abortions and then seek treatment for complications? What happens in cultures where unmarried young women face social, familial, and educational ostracism for being pregnant; where teens often are physically too immature to carry a pregnancy to term and give birth safely without significant clinical intervention; where they are uneducated, and unable to afford a child; where abortion is legally restricted and socially unacceptable? What kind of treatment do young women seeking postabortion care (PAC) services receive from health care providers, and what care and information do they need? And once adolescents have received PAC services, do they know how to prevent unwanted pregnancies in the future? There is still much to learn about how best to provide PAC services to adolescents. To this end, EngenderHealth conducted studies in the Dominican Republic and Malawi in 2002 and 2003, respectively, to determine how hospitals can better meet adolescents' needs for PAC. (excerpt)
Web site : http://www.engenderhealth.org/res/offc/pac/adolescent/pdf/pac_adol_report.pdf