Prevalence of Post-Abortion Morbidity in arural community: A Neglected Burden

Background: the issue of abortion is a threat to women's reproductive wellbeing and unsafe abortions performed by unskilled attendantsis major cause of post abortion morbidity in pakistan and other developing countries. aim: to identify prevalence of postabortion morbidity in unsafe and safe abortions in ever- married women of reproductive age group residing in dyal village wahga town lahore. methods: cross sectional comparative study conducted in dyal village,wahga town,lahore in 2013-14. all 746 houses were surveyed and 196 ever-married women with abortion history were identified,out of these,139 had abortionduring the last five years so they were consecutively enrolled but only 86 gave consent for the study. a semi-structured questionnaire with open and close-ended questions used to gather the information for abortion variatesand post abortion morbidity. results: eighty six women experienced 402 pregnancies during their reproductive span.among these 402 pregnancies,experienced no of abortions was 127/402 (31.6%). out of 120 abortions included per study inclusion criterion,unsafeabortions were 46/120 (38.3%). 88/120 (73.33%) abortions cases had received health care services,out of which 36/88 (40.90%) were performed by dai. post abortion morbiditywas 74/120 (61.7%). all 74 abortioncases experienced pain and weakness,89.19% bleeding,89.19% fever,24.32% vaginal discharge,13.51% had retained products of conception and 5.41% had uterine damage.significant association found between health care provider for abortion and post abortion morbidity with p value<0.001. conclusion: post abortion morbidity is quite high in rural communities and is associated more with unsafe abortions widely practiced by the unskilled persons.