Rate of Young Women Getting Sterilized Doubled After ‘Roe’ Was Overturned – KFF Health News

HELENA, Mont. — Sophia the First remembers how she felt when she found out the Supreme Court had filed a lawsuit against her. Roe vs. WadeShe needed to be sterilized.

Within a week, she asked her provider about having the procedure done.

First, 28, said she always knew she didn’t want children. She also worries about becoming pregnant as a result of sexual assault and then being unable to access abortion services. “It’s not crazy anymore,” she said.

“I think kids are really fun. I see kids in my therapy practice, too, but I understand kids are a big responsibility,” she said.

In Montana, where the Firsts live, lawmakers have passed several bills Bills restricting access to abortionwhich are embroiled in court. 41 states have restrictions or prohibitions On abortion, according to the Guttmacher Institute and anti-abortion groups advocated restricting contraception Access has decreased in recent years.

after Roe deer Doctors said it will be reversed in June 2022 wave of young people As such, First began seeking permanent birth control, such as tubal ligation, in which the fallopian tubes are removed, or a male sterilization.

New research published in JAMA Health Forum this spring shows just how large this wave of young people is on a national level.

University of Pittsburgh researcher Jackie Ellison and her co-authors TriNetX useda national medical records database, to see how many people ages 18 to 30 had undergone sterilizations before and after the decision. They found explosive growth In sterilization of both men and women. tubal ligation doubled Ellison said the rate of sterilizations has more than tripled from June 2022 to September 2023. Despite this increase, women are still getting sterilized much more often than men. Sterilization rates have stabilized at new high rates, while tubal ligations are still on the rise.

The trend towards sterilization among young people has been rising gradually over the past several years, but Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization It clearly had an impact. “We saw a significant increase in both tubal ligation and male sterilization procedures DobbsAlison said.

The data was not broken down by state. But at least in states like Montana, where the future of abortion rights is very uncertain, OB-GYNs and urologists say they’re noticing the phenomenon.

OB-GYN based in Kalispell, Montana Gina Nelson She said she was seeing women of all ages, whether they had children or not, being motivated to undergo sterilisation because of the Supreme Court order. Dobbs decision.

He said the biggest change is in younger patients who don’t have children and want sterilizations. He said that’s a big change from when he started practicing 30 years ago.

Nelson said she feels she is better equipped to talk about the procedure now than she was in the 1990s, when she first had a 21-year-old patient ask for a sterilization. “I wanted to respect her rights, but I also wanted her to consider a number of future scenarios, so, I actually asked her to write an essay for me, and then she came up with it, overcame all the obstacles, and I tied her tubes,” she said.

Nelson said she doesn’t force patients to do this today, but she still believes it’s her responsibility to help patients think deeply about their needs. She schedules time to talk with patients about the risks and benefits of all their birth control options. She said she believes this helps her patients make an informed decision about moving forward with permanent birth control.

American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists Nelson supports the practice,

Lewis KingProviders are warming to the idea of ​​listening to their patients, rather than deciding for them whether or not they can obtain permanent contraception based on age, or whether or not they can have children, said Katherine Silveri, an assistant professor of obstetrics at Harvard Medical School who helps lead ACOG’s ethics committee.

Some young patients who ask about sterilization never go through with the procedure, King said. She recalled a recent patient who decided against tubal ligation after King talked to her about IUDs.

“They were afraid of the pain,” he said. But after he assured the patients they would be under the influence of anesthesia and would not feel any pain, he began using the intrauterine device, a reversible birth control method.

Helena-based OB-GYN Alexis O’Leary There is a divide between younger and older providers when it comes to female sterilization. O’Leary completed her residency six years ago. She said older providers are more reluctant to sterilize younger patients.

“I will regularly see patients who have been turned down by other people, saying, ‘Ah, you might want to have children in the future.’ ‘You don’t have enough children.’ ‘Are you sure you want to do this? It’s not reversible,’” she said.

This is what happened to First when she tried to get sterilized for the first time.

After having the IUD for about a year, she asked her doctor for it. First remembers that her male OB-GYN told her to bring her partner, who was male at the time, and her parents along so they could talk about whether she could get a sterilization.

“I was shocked by it,” she said.

So First got her IUD put in. But the uncertainty about abortion rights in Montana prompted her to ask again.

She has found a young obstetrician-gynecologist who has agreed to perform a sterilization on her this year.

This article is from a partnership that includes MTPR, nprand KFF Health News.