The Problems and Anxiety Levels of Women Who Had Elective or Therapeutic Abortion

Objective: This study was carried out as a case-control study to identify the problems and anxiety levels of the women who had elective or therapeutic abortion. Methods: The sample of the study consists of 200 women who applied to the Family Planning Clinic and Early Pregnancy Clinic in a Women Health and Obstetric Hospital. The data is collected by using quasi-structured questionnaire Form and Beck Anxiety Inventory. Results: Seventy nine percent of women who had elective abortion (EA) and 52.0% of women who had therapeutic abortion (TA) stated that they had difficulty during decision-making period for abortion. It has been reported that the most experienced problems after the abortion were pain (25.5% EA; 45.3% TA), and sadness due to the loss of the baby (15.4% EA; 13.3% TA). It has been determined that both women who had EA and those who had TA suffered from mild anxiety. It has been identified that the pre-abortion anxiety point medians of women having had EA or TA were higher than post-abortion anxiety point medians (preabortion median: 16, post-abortion median: 6.5 for EA; pre-abortion median: 9, post-abortion median: 2 for TA) (p 0.05). Conclusion: Women having had abortion have problems such as fear and pain as they are not informed sufficiently for the procedure