Abortion in Thoothukudi: Your safe and confidential options
Are you residing in Thoothukudi, the traditional “Pearl City” of the Indian state Tamil Nadu, India?
This post is for married women, unmarried girls, single women and all couples struggling with unwanted pregnancies.
Many women and girls in Thoothukudi are unaware of their safe abortion options. And this post will help you learn why should you not attempt a self-abortion. At the same time, it will also help you learn your safe, legal and confidential abortion options.
The first and the most important thing for you is to know that you do have a safe way out of unintended pregnancy. So, please stay calm. Do not take any wrong step in anxiety. By the wrong step, we mean a wrong move in terms of unsafe abortion.
Do not self-medicate or take abortion pills in Thoothukudi (Tuticorin) without proper consultation with a doctor. It carries immense risks and side effects, some of which are irreversible.
Always look for safe abortion options before you tempt to fall for unsafe methods.
Things you should know before you visit an abortion hospital:
As a sigh of relief, there are a few points in brief that you should know before visiting an abortion clinic. These are:
- Abortion in Thoothukudi, India is legal. So, if you want to obtain one, do not think that it is illegal and you change your direction towards unsafe methods.
- Abortion in India is legal irrespective of a woman’s marital status. This means you can obtain a legal abortion in India both as a married woman or as a single woman or a widow or even as an unmarried girl.
- You can obtain a legal abortion in India for up to 20 weeks into gestation normally. However, in some cases, you can obtain it even beyond this period.
- You do not need anyone else’s consent for an abortion if you are an adult. Any girl in India who has attained the age of 18 years is an adult and can ask for a legal abortion without involving her partner or parents.
- As per the MTP Act 2021, the hospital cannot share your pregnancy and abortion details with anyone else. But visiting a nearby abortion clinic always carries a risk of meeting an acquaintance. So, you can choose to travel to a distant city for a confidential abortion if you are willing to keep your pregnancy and abortion status absolutely private.
- Your abortion options depend largely on your pregnancy length and location. So, when you have decided to proceed with pregnancy termination, do not delay. Delaying shall narrow down your choices. Besides, risks with abortion also intensify when you seek abortion at a late stage.
Methods of abortion according to pregnancy length:
What is the gestation period?
Pregnancy length or gestation period is the time duration you have come ahead in your pregnancy. In humans, the normal gestation age is nearly 9 months or 40 weeks or 280 days. It may vary from woman to woman according to her specific conditions. But the standard and average pregnancy in humans lasts for full-term up to this time.
And abortion in India is legal for up to the first 20 weeks of your pregnancy. However, pregnancy termination methods vary according to different factors, like pregnancy length, location and patient-specific factors.
In this section of the post, we shall discuss the different methods of abortion for terminating an intrauterine pregnancy.
The World Health Organization (WHO) has taken into its account several considerations that impact women’s health and life with respect to abortions. To make Comprehensive Abortion Care (CAC) available to all women and girls alike to help save their health and life, it recommends three safe abortion methods for terminating normal pregnancies. These are:
- The medical method of abortion
- Vacuum Aspiration (VA) method of abortion
- Surgical abortion or the Dilatation and Evacuation (D&E) method of abortion
Medical abortion:
This is the earliest abortion method in which safe abortion pills help in pregnancy termination. The WHO recommends this method for terminating pregnancies that are less than 6-8 weeks. Beyond this period, abortion with pills may result in incomplete abortion.
When you visit a registered abortion hospital near you, the doctor may check your vitals. Your medical history, your allergies, any co-existing medical condition, any medicines you may be taking and other medical information is essential to ascertain whether you are eligible for a medical abortion.
The doctor shall then ask you to have some routine blood and urine examination and transvaginal ultrasound. They will help the doctor know the exact length and location of your pregnancy. If the location is intrauterine and your pregnancy is less than 8 weeks, the doctor may prescribe you abortion pills.
Also, the doctor will check other specific factors that can impact the choice of abortion method for you. For instance, if you are taking certain medicines like long-term corticosteroid therapy or medicines for any condition of adrenal glands.
Since the method involves moderate to heavy bleeding, women who are taking blood thinners either for hypertension or some other problems like Lupus or Deep Vein Thrombosis (DVT) are not eligible for abortion pills.
Even patients with porphyria or the ones who got pregnant as a failure of contraceptive, in this case, an intrauterine device (IUD) are not eligible for a medical abortion.
The doctor will rule out all complications and side effects with abortion pills before prescribing them to you. Only if you are eligible, the doctor shall prescribe you abortion pills.
The procedure:
Medical abortion happens in two different steps.
The first stage of medical abortion:
The first abortion medicine is Mifepristone. It is an anti-progestin. It blocks the production of the hormone Progesterone and also the action of available ones.
Progesterone is essential for the growth and development of the embryo into the fetus and through the full term of the pregnancy. In its absence, the embryo is unable to draw nutrition and stops growing.
When you visit the abortion clinic, the doctor shall give you this first pill. You may have to take it orally at the clinic itself. Or if the doctor seems intravaginal mode of administration better for you, the same may be the preference.
After taking Mifepristone, you may return home or the office and resume your daily work. You may not feel any change at this stage.
The second stage of medical abortion:
Now, the second stage is the second abortion pill, Misoprostol. Either the doctor will hand it to you during the first appointment itself. Or in some cases, the doctor may ask you to come to the hospital on a second appointment that may be at a gap of 24-36 hours.
Misoprostol is an abortifacient. It contracts the uterus. These contractions will lead to the expulsion of the embryo and other gestation products from the patient’s womb. After taking this pill, the patient can expect to have an abortion in nearly 4-6 hours.
In some cases, the doctor may even prescribe an MTP kit. The woman may have to purchase the medicines from the pharmacy. With the prescription, you will receive the directions for taking each medicine.
What next?
The abortion comes in the form of moderate to heavy bleeding. Some women may experience mild pain while some others may have very severe cramps.
The bleeding continues for up to days and sometimes weeks. But in case your bleeding doesn’t stop within 10 days post-abortion, have a follow-up to ascertain if your abortion is complete.
The doctor shall also prescribe you some hematinic to make up for the blood loss. You may also have to take some prophylactic antibiotics to prevent the onset of infections.
In a case of very heavy bleeding after the abortion, please speak to the healthcare provider at the earliest. You may need a blood transfusion in case of excessive blood loss.
For pain management, the doctor may prescribe you some mild pain relievers. However, if you seek a painless abortion, you can choose another method, Suction abortion. Suction abortion has added advantages of being more efficient, painless, single appointment, minimum bleeding and no waiting for up to a week before the abortion is complete.
All hospitals may not have the tools and equipment for suction abortion. You can choose to schedule an appointment at American Hospital Bangalore (AHB) for a safe, legal, confidential and painless Gentle Care suction abortion.
Vacuum Aspiration (VA) method of abortion:
Gestation age:
The WHO recommends using VA or suction abortion for terminating pregnancies less than 12 weeks. Even patients who are eligible for medical abortion can have a suction abortion for the advantages mentioned in the above section.
The procedure:
Suction abortion, the name is itself suggestive of the process suction used for womb cleaning. An aspirator helps in vacuum creation. The aspirator connects to a collection bottle at one end and a slender tube called vacurette to the other end.
The nurses prepare the patient to lie in the lithotomy position. Then, the doctor cleans the cervix region to prevent the occurrence of infections. Next, the doctor gently inserts the vacurette to reach the womb. When the vacurette is in the right place, the doctor turns on the aspirator.
Turning on the aspirator creates a vacuum that helps in sucking the embryo and other gestation products. The sucked products collect within the collection bottle. The doctor regularly examines the collectables to check if all products have been evacuated.
If all products have been removed, the doctor may turn off the aspirator and gently remove the vacurette from the womb. In case some pregnancy tissue remains attached to the uterine lining, the doctor may remove them with help of sterile tools like forceps. The aspirator again helps in sucking them out.
It is a very short procedure. The entire procedure lasts no more than 10 minutes. The doctor may choose to perform the abortion under mild local or general anesthesia to make it painless.
After the abortion, the doctor may again clean the cervix. Then the nurses may help the patient to get in a relaxed position and shift to a private room for resting until discharge.
Most women take discharge within an hour post-abortion.
Why suction abortion at American Hospital Bangalore (AHB)?
AHB is a premier boutique hospital specializing in Gentle Care abortions. Having a suction abortion at AHB rather than at an abortion clinic near you in Thoothukudi has several benefits, some of which are:
- Single-appointment
- Same-day discharge
- Short procedure (3-10 minutes)
- Nearly 100% efficient which means there are zero to minimum chances of incomplete abortion.
- Painless abortion
- Confidential abortion: Visiting a nearby abortion hospital may compromise your privacy. However, visiting a distant city, Bangalore will have minimum chances of you meeting an acquaintance.
- Highly qualified and experienced doctors
- Caring, supporting and compassionate nurses
- Non-judgmental abortion: Whether you are married or unmarried or a single woman, the hospital treats all patients with patient health and safety as the priority. No doctor, nurse or any hospital staff judges any patient for their personal choices and decisions. All patients receive the highest quality professional treatment that is in their best interest.
Due consideration is given to each patient’s safety of health, life and privacy. No patient details can leave the hospital premises in any manner. Abortion and personal details of each patient are highly confidential and they receive similar treatment.
You can call on AHB’s helpline number to schedule an appointment for early abortion. The coordinator at the hospital can guide you into your travel options from Thoothukudi to Bangalore.
The coordinator will also schedule your abortion appointment and your overnight stay options near the hospital. And will also give you directions for all documents regarding your medical history you will have to accompany if any.
If you have any other queries, you can speak to a healthcare professional and your queries are addressed at the earliest.
Surgical abortion:
Surgical or the Dilatation & Evacuation (D&E) method of abortion is the method preferred for terminating late-stage pregnancies. All abortions beyond 12 weeks through 20 weeks may not be complete with suction, alone. Therefore, the WHO recommends the D&E method of abortion for terminating second-trimester pregnancies.
The Procedure:
The surgical abortion method is almost the same in most abortion hospitals. However, some hospitals use dilatants that are left to work overnight. This means, the patient admission, abortion and discharge may not be available on a single appointment.
However, at hospitals like AHB, surgical abortions are single-appointment and same-day discharge short procedures.
The nurses help the patient lie in the lithotomy position. The cervix cleaning prevents the chances of infections. After the cervix cleaning, its dilation helps the doctor in cleaning the womb.
The doctor uses sterile and slender tools like forceps for spooning the uterine cavity. And an aspirator as in the suction abortion helps in removing the collected pregnancy products. This procedure is slightly invasive and hence the doctor prefers it under general or local anesthesia.
This makes the procedure painless. Moreover, since the patient is in a relaxed state, the doctor can perform the abortion safely and efficiently with precision and accuracy.
At AHB, D&E abortion gets complete within 30 minutes. After the abortion, the nurses shift the patient to a private room where she can relax until discharge. You can expect to feel better in less than an hour. And then, you can take discharge as per your convenience.
Surgical abortion is nearly 100% efficient. Even the incomplete abortions that may occur with medical abortion need this procedure for abortion completion.
You can expect zero to minimum bleeding after suction or D&E abortions at AHB because the doctor removes most of the placental tissue with the embryo during the procedure.
Methods of abortion according to pregnancy location:
Intrauterine pregnancies:
Pregnancy location is the place where the embryo implants itself after fertilization. In normal pregnancies, the fertilization takes place in one of the two fallopian tubes connecting the ovaries to the uterus.
The fertilized egg then travels down the tube to reach the uterine cavity. It implants somewhere in the uterine lining and starts developing thereby deriving nutrition from the mother’s blood.
This is the case of a normal or intrauterine pregnancy. The methods of abortion discussed above are for terminating these types of normal or intrauterine pregnancies, that is within the womb.
Extrauterine pregnancies:
But in some cases, the fertilized egg does not reach the uterine cavity. In some cases, it may remain in the tube itself. Or it may attach to the cervix lining. Or it may also reach the abdominal cavity rather than the uterine cavity. These are the cases of ectopic or extrauterine pregnancies.
Such pregnancies are not viable and hence they need proper treatment to save the patient’s reproductive health and life. Ectopic pregnancies need immediate treatment or they may even prove fatal.
Ectopic pregnancies when detected at an early stage can receive medical treatment. The doctor may use medicines, oral or in injectable forms. These medicines treat the embryo as a foreign body and stop its growth. Also, it helps in its removal.
However, in some late cases, the ectopic pregnancy may continue to grow in size for up to a few weeks until it ruptures. Most of the tubal pregnancies rupture leading to a burst tube. The patient in such events faints due to internal bleeding. Immediate surgery by laparoscopy is the immediate line of treatment to remove the ruptured tube and connecting ovary.
Immediate medical attention is essential to save a woman’s life. Although removal of the tube and ovary can affect the reproductive health of the woman and reduce her chances of getting pregnant in future to half, her life is safe.
Early detection and removal with the medicines can not only save the patient’s life but also save her fertility without impacting future pregnancies.
The advice:
As soon as you discover that you are pregnant, please consult a doctor to have an ultrasound for detecting the exact length and location of the pregnancy. And in case of an ectopic pregnancy, please seek immediate medical help.
Never self-administer abortion pills without a doctor’s consultation. In case of an ectopic pregnancy, abortion pills will do not help. Abortion will not take place and the pregnancy may rupture within your body leading to hemorrhage.
Travelling to American Hospital Bangalore from Thoothukudi for a safe, legal and confidential abortion:
Thoothukudi is at a distance of nearly 581 km from Bangalore. You can book a short flight from Tuticorin to Bangalore or can visit by bus or a train or a cab or your car as per your preference.
Or you can also ask the coordinator at the hospital to make the necessary travel, stay and abortion arrangements for you as per the available date and time.
When you visit by appointment, you do not have to wait for your turn. You won’t have to be a part of any waiting queue. The doctor shall see you shortly and provide you with one-to-one consultation.
The doctor will analyze your medical condition and after some tests will prescribe you the best abortion method. You will receive guidance on your available abortion options and what to expect. If you have any concerns, you may ask the doctor during the consultation.
All abortion procedures at AHB are safe, efficient and confidential. Most of the unmarried girls and women from Tuticorin choose to travel to Bangalore for a safe, comfortable, confidential and non-judgmental abortion.
After the abortion, your coordinator can hire a cab for you to take you to your hotel. You can rest overnight and return to Thoothukudi the following day or as per your travel arrangements.
Since delaying an abortion narrows down your abortion options, please do not delay. Do not hesitate in asking for help. AHB’s helpline is open to help all women and girls access safe abortions. You can also choose to drop a message or send a WhatsApp message. The concerned person shall reach out to you at the earliest.
Schedule an appointment for personalized abortion care at the best abortion hospital in India today.
Related Posts:
- The period after abortion: What to expect, how to deal with
- Up to how many weeks can you have a medical abortion?
- What to do and how to deal with an unwanted pregnancy?
- Cost of abortion: Medical vs Surgical methods of abortion
- Post-abortion: How to cope up, heal early and live better
Leave a Comment