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March 6, 2008
Indian Woman
Photo courtesy of the David and Lucille Packard Foundation.

The Chincholi Public Health Center (PHC) in Maharashtra, India serves 23 nearby villages with a total population of 36,000. Dr. Meghna Shevgan, the only medical officer at the PHC, has been working there for four years, but before she and a staff nurse attended an Ipas-sponsored medical termination of pregnancy certification training in September 2007, the center provided no abortion services.

Dr. Shevgan was apprehensive about leaving the center without a medical officer while she attended the 24-day training, but today, she is glad she took that step.

“When I joined the PHC the services we provided were very basic,” she says. “The training in comprehensive abortion care [CAC] enabled me to view abortion from a woman's perspective. It made me understand that abortion is not just a clinical service but also has equally important social and emotional dimensions.”

Dr. Shevgan has passed these lessons along not only to the PHC staff but also to the auxiliary nurse midwives, who carry the messages to nearby villages. Now the center receives women seeking abortions from Chincholi, as well as from outlying villages. From October through December 2007, Dr. Shevgan handled 23 cases. Previously, women in the Chincholi area had to travel more than 60 miles to Sillod or Aurangabad, neither of which were easily accessible by public transportation. She has also started advising women about the importance of contraception.

“Counseling during the CAC process is an important opportunity to talk to the woman about [her] choice of contraceptives to prevent repeated abortions,” Dr. Shevgan says. “Following the training, our site is now providing this service regularly to women.”

Although abortion has been legal in India for decades, unsafe abortions far outnumber legal procedures. An estimated 16 percent of reported maternal deaths stem from unsafe, illegal abortions. Based in New Delhi, Ipas India works with local governments to implement safe abortion care.

For more information, contact:
Kirsten Sherk
Senior Associate, Media Relations
e-mail: sherkk@ipas.org
phone: 919.960.5612
fax: 919.929.0258