Abstract :
Background: Medical abortion (MA) is the mechanism by which the administration of one or more drugs Willingly interrupts a pregnancy.
Around 46 million induced abortions occur annually worldwide. About half of these are unsafe they occur in developing countries. With the goal of decreasing the number of maternal deaths due to unsafe abortions, the MTP Act of India (1971) was adopted to abortions. This study was carried out on women who presented with complaints following self-administration of abortion pills and thereby on the demographic profiles, grounds for having an abortion, abortion providers and the various outcomes with management.
Materials and Methods: An observational study was carried out in 100 women who reported with complaints seeking medical help consumption of abortion pills to the Department of Obstetrics and , Institute of Medical Sciences and PBM Hospital, between September 2018 and June 2020.
Results: Unmet need for spacing and unwanted pregnancy was the main reason behind self-administration of these pills. Most frequent presenting complaint was excessive bleeding per (78%). 12% of the women presented with severe and another 12% were diagnosed with pregnancy. Surgical intervention was carried out in a majority (84%) of the cases.
Conclusion: These unsafe abortions mostly go unnoticed and come to the limelight only when women present with serious consequences. This study highlights the immediate need for regulation and prohibition of unrestricted access to these drugs by the public.
Keyword :
Ectopic pregnancy, Maternal morbidity, Unsafe abortion.