Abstract
Background: There are contrasting debates about abortions and prohibitory regulations posed serious public health challenges especially in underdeveloped and developing countries. Due to paucity of the empirical evidences this study was conducted to explore the existent cumulative knowledge with special focus on the applied methodology. Methods: A comprehensive review of published articles from January 1995 to December 2015 was performed. Several databases including: Embase, PubMed, Cochrane and also databasesof the Iranian medical journals were searched using combinations of relevant Medical Subject Headings (MeSH terms) and their equivalents, i.e., induced abortion, embryotomy, criminal abortion and illegal abortion. The STrengthening the Reporting of OBservational studies in Epidemiology (STROBE) statement for appraisal of the cross-sectional studies and Consolidated Criteria for Reporting Qualitative Research (COREQ) checklist for the qualitative reports were utilized. After removal of duplicates and irrelevant publications 36 articles remained for data analysis. Results: A wide heterogeneity was observed in the utilized methodology with no standard data collection tool. Face to face interview and self-administered questionnaire were the most common reported data collection/tool respectively. Married and unemployed women of 26-30 years old age group with low socioeconomic backgrounds were the most typical illegal abortees in the included studies. Conclusion: Despite limitation in accessing all relevant publications and including only those reports written in English or Persian languages, the accumulated knowledge might be applicable to develop a potentially inclusive data collection tool and hence, improve the quality of data collection and/or application of a more robust study design in future investigations.
Highlights
There are contrasting debates about abortions irrespective of the reasons or circumstances in which they were performed
In countries where a total ban has been imposed on induced abortion or it is merely legally allowed under certain conditions many women in consequence; search for clandestine abortion or what literally is called backyard abortion, that is too often unsafe and endanger women’s life or leave serious complications.[4]
Characteristics of the women who reported to have illegal abortion, attributes of the illegal abortion providers, reasons to seek for induced abortion and conditions in which the abortions had been carried out incorporated
Summary
There are contrasting debates about abortions irrespective of the reasons or circumstances in which they were performed. Prohibitory laws and regulation; posed serious public health challenges in different countries especially in underdeveloped and developing countries.[1,2,3,4] Induced abortion by definition is intentional termination of a pregnancy by medical or surgical means before the fetus can be viable.[2] Unsafe abortion; refers to ending of a pregnancy by individuals who lack the required medical skills to perform the procedure, its administration in a sub-optimal environment condition which is deficient in the basic and minimal medical standards, or both.[3] In countries where a total ban has been imposed on induced abortion or it is merely legally allowed under certain conditions many women in consequence; search for clandestine abortion or what literally is called backyard abortion, that is too often unsafe and endanger women’s life or leave serious complications.[4]. Conclusion: Despite limitation in accessing all relevant publications and including only those reports written in English or Persian languages, the accumulated knowledge might be applicable to develop a potentially inclusive data collection tool and improve the quality of data collection and/or application of a more robust study design in future investigations
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