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Researchers found that women and men who expressed dissatisfaction with their pre-abortion counseling tended to suffer posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

Men and women who felt they had inadequate counseling before an abortion, as well as those who disagreed with their partners about the decision to abort, were more likely to experience personal and interpersonal problems following the procedure, according to a new paper published in the medical journal Traumatology.

Researchers Catherine T. Coyle, Priscilla K. Coleman, and Vincent M. Rue—all experts in the after-effects of abortion—collected data via online surveys from 374 women who had a prior abortion and 198 men whose partners had experienced elective abortion.  

The results found that women who expressed dissatisfaction with their pre-abortion counseling tended to have relationship problems, such as obsessive intrusion, avoidance, and hyperarousal—and also tended to describe the full diagnostic criteria for posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD).  Men with the same pre-abortion experience reported similar interpersonal trauma.
When the individuals reported that their partner disagreed with the decision to abort, women were more likely to report PTSD and intrusion tendencies, while in men such disagreement was linked with PTSD, intrusion, hyperarousal, and other relationship problems. 

The researchers pointed out that few studies have examined men’s psychological responses to elective abortion, although the procedure has been commonly linked to subsequent feelings of anger, anxiety, guilt, grief, and powerlessness in men.
“Although men are involved with conception and abortion, they are not routinely offered abortion counseling,” they write.  “Despite the call for greater inclusion of and attention to males in abortion clinics, little has changed.  Most men who accompany women for abortion do not receive counseling and are left alone to wait.”

David Reardon, Executive Director of the Eliott Institute, told LifeSiteNews.com in an email that the results of the study confirmed the importance of legislation to enforce better regulations on abortion, such as Missouri’s Negligent Screening Act, which would mandate that women seeking abortion be evaluated for risk factors for adverse psychological effects following an abortion, such as whether she is being coerced or pressured into the procedure. 

According to Reardon, “Proper screening and counseling will reduce abortion rates, especially among women being pressured into unwanted or unsafe abortions, and will also reduce the rate of psychological illness associated with abortion.”

LifeSiteNews.com