Women who have abortions--are they different?

The aim of the study is to test the hypothesis that there is no difference between women who are currently undergoing an abortion and those who are not in an inner London health district.

One hundred and thirty-one consecutive attenders at an inner city day-care abortion service were compared, using a self-administered questionnaire, with two other groups: a random sample of 142 women aged between 18 and 45 taken from the local Family Health Services Authority age-sex register, and 149 consecutive attenders at the district's antenatal clinic.

Women in the abortion group were found to be very similar to those in the antenatal sample in terms of social class, obstetric history, ethnic origin and knowledge of contraception. Women in the population survey, however, were found to be older, of higher social class, more likely to be white and of UK origin, and to have higher contraceptive knowledge scores. However, when the results were adjusted for age, the differences in social class and several other variables disappeared, although differences in ethnic origin remained.

It was concluded that apart from age and ethnic origin, there were no differences between women who were having abortions and those who were not. The evidence points to abortion rates being a function of fertility rate, which is in turn a function of culture, rather than the results of the activities of individual or sub-groups of women at particular risk.