Abortion is the termination of a pregnancy before 20-22 weeks and in which the embryo or fetus weighs less than 500 grams. It is commonly called “abortion”; however, abortion is the product of abortion. In Brazil, legal abortion is permitted when there is a risk of death to the pregnant woman, rape or in cases of anencephalic fetuses. However, clandestine abortions are performed by women of all social and economic levels, resulting in high mortality rates. In services that perform legal abortions, the practice is often hindered by health professionals due to: personal reasons (ethical, religious issues, etc.); conscientious objection and requirement of documents that are not necessary. In this sense, this study aimed to evaluate the level of knowledge of resident physicians in Gynecology and Obstetrics at the Santa Casa de Misericórdia do Pará Foundation (FSCMPA) about the legal bases related to abortion in Brazil. This was a cross-sectional, descriptive, quantitative study, which was authorized (Opinion Number: 7,056,464; CAAE: 80556924.0.0000.5171). Residents enrolled in one of the medical residency programs in Gynecology and Obstetrics who work at FSCMPA and who agreed to participate in the investigation answered a structured questionnaire, whose questions addressed the sociodemographic profile and the level of knowledge and perception about the gestational interruption program provided by law. The collected data were tabulated in Microsoft Excel, which was used to generate graphs and tables. The Power BI® tool was used to create images. The Jamovi® software was used to perform the Chi-Square and Fisher's Exact tests. The criteria for statistical significance were defined as p ≤ 0.05. In all, 59 responses were collected. The study participants were predominantly female (91.53%), were between 25 and 35 years old (91.53%), had a partner/spouse (57.63%) and 93.22% had no children. Regarding religious orientation, the predominance varied between Catholics (52.54%) and Evangelicals (22.03%). Regarding the right to abortion, 44.07% fully agreed and 30.51% partially agreed, 13.56% fully disagreed and 11.86% partially disagreed. Men showed a higher proportion of full agreement (60%), and among women, agreement was 48.15%. Significant relationships were found between religious orientation and legal terminations of pregnancy (p = 0.004) and conscientious objection with gender (p = 0.047) and year of residence (p = 0.015). Participation in courses, workshops or lectures on ethical and legal aspects of abortion was significantly associated with both religious orientation (p = 0.036) and year of residency (p = 0.040). The results highlight the differences observed in the perception of the legal requirements for performing legal abortion and conscientious objection among physicians, highlighting the importance of continuous education, with more robust and integrated educational strategies that promote technical, ethical and legal understanding from the beginning of residency.
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