Transparency around abortion training on obstetrics and gynecology residency program websites. 2024

Aishwarya Karlapudi, and Radhika Rible, and Kavita Vinekar
Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, David Geffen School of Medicine at University of California, Los Angeles, CA, United States. Electronic address: akarlapudi@ucla.edu.

OBJECTIVE The availability of family planning and abortion training in residency is a concern for applicants, particularly following the overturning of Roe v Wade. We aimed to characterize public information on abortion training in obstetrics and gynecology residency programs in states with and without abortion bans. METHODS We abstracted residency program data using a publicly available database of obstetrics and gynecology residency programs. We performed a systematic internet search of each program's website to identify information on abortion training. We defined states with abortion bans as those with total or near-total bans as of November 2022. Using Stata SE 16, we used Student t tests and Fisher exact tests to characterize differences between programs with public abortion training information and those without. RESULTS Of 293 obstetrics and gynecology residency programs, 197 (67.2%) included online information regarding abortion training. Of 64 programs in states with abortion bans, 34 (53%) had public information regarding abortion training, compared to 163 (71%) of the 229 programs in states with legal abortion. Programs with publicly available abortion training information were more likely to be academic (49.8% vs 26%, p < 0.001) and have a higher percentage of female residents (86.6% vs 82.9%, p = 0.003). Programs in states with legal abortion were more likely to use words like "abortion" (36.2% vs 17.7%, p = 0.05). CONCLUSIONS Only two-thirds of obstetrics and gynecology residency programs publicize abortion training information. Almost half of all programs in states with abortion bans do not share this information, revealing a need for improved transparency to better inform residency applicant decision-making. CONCLUSIONS During the 2022-2023 academic cycle, one-third of obstetrics and gynecology residency programs did not include information about family planning or abortion training online. In states with abortion bans, this number increased to almost one-half. These findings serve as a call to action for programs to clarify their commitment to abortion training.

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