Category: Emotional Impact on Providers

An author who interviewed abortionists and nurses who assisted in abortions says:

“Abortion work is not easy. Late-term abortions are horrific. Nurses doing abortions after the first trimester of pregnancy either seem rather distressed by what is going on, or appear rather as cynical and hard. When they are distressed it may be that their caring role and training is still fundamentally at odds with the termination of pregnancy.”

Mary Kenny Abortion: The Whole Story (London: Quartet Books, 1986) 272 – 273

These nurses had to see aborted children on a daily basis.

On how abortion affects nurses:

“Dr. Nancy Kaltreider, an academic psychiatrist at the University of San Francisco, has found in several studies “an unexpectedly strong reaction” by the assisting staff to late-abortion procedures. For nurses, she hypothesizes, handling tissues that resemble a fully formed baby “runs directly against the medical emphasis on preserving life.”

“Abortion: The Dreaded Complication” by Liz Jeffries and Rick Edmonds, Philadelphia Inquirer Aug 2, 1982

An abortion worker explains how the abortionist she works with helps her deal with the graphic reality of late term abortions.

Nobody likes doing abortions. The later abortions can be especially distressing. I was brought up as a Christian, and of course it’s upsetting to me. But in medicine you learn to do what is necessary in the best way, and Mr. Paintin [the abortionist] is wonderful and has explained to us that we are doing the best in difficult circumstances.”

Mary Kenny Abortion: The Whole Story (London: Quartet Books, 1986) 154

One article on abortion providers said the following:

“Ambivalent periods were characterized by a variety of otherwise uncharacteristic feelings and behavior including withdrawal from colleagues, resistance to going to work, lack of energy, in patients with clients and an overall sense of uneasiness. Nightmares, images that could not be shaken and preoccupation were commonly reported. Also common was the deep and lonely privacy within which practitioners had grappled with their ambivalence.”

Kathleen M Roe “Private Troubles and Public Issues: Providing Abortion and Is Competing Definitions” Social Science and Medicine 29 (1989): 1197

From one abortion clinic worker:

“I think I must switch off my emotions, I have become hardened.”

Joanna Brien, Ida Fairbairn Pregnancy and Abortion Counseling (London: Routledge, 1996) 169

From a British nurse who helped with abortions:

“I was a staff nurse on a gynecological ward for a year and came into contact with many girls and women undergoing abortions. It was always a painful experience emotionally for both the staff and patients, particularly if the abortion was of a wanted baby that was unfortunately abnormal.”

Mary Kenny Abortion: The Whole Story (London: Quartet Books, 1986) 269-270

In England, some abortions take place in hospitals rather than freestanding clinics, so nurses who assist with other operations sometimes are called upon to help with abortions.