ABORTION: HOW IS IT DONE?
There are various ways of performing an abortion, but they all involve removing the products of conception from the uterus. The products of conception include the placenta, the sac enclosing the pregnancy, and what is called either an embryo or foetus, depending on the stage of development it has reached. It is called an embryo for the first eight weeks from conception, and foetus after eight weeks.
Very early abortion, before six weeks from the last period, has been called menstrual regulation, or menstrual induction. Historically it has been done when a period is late, without confirming whether there is or is not an ongoing pregnancy. Not knowing if there was a pregnancy helped some people cope with the ethical dilemmas involved with abortion. One of the problems with this method, though, is that a significant number of pregnancies (about one in 100) will continue, despite the procedure. Another is that although the complication rate is low, it is not without its risks, and was often performed on women who in fact were not pregnant, but just late with their periods. As there are now better methods of safe and legal abortion in Australia, the technique is rarely used here. However, it is still performed by some practitioners overseas.
The majority of abortions in Australia are performed at between seven and twelve weeks of gestation. This is the time at which the failure rate is least, and the safety of the procedure is highest. The technique used is called suction curettage, and is similar to the method used to perform diagnostic dilatation and curettages (D and C), which are sometimes performed when women have abnormal bleeding.
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