1. Did you ever personally see a tragedy as a result of an illegal abortion?

ANSWER:	PERCENT:
YES	71.38%
NO	28.62%

2. If yes to the above question, was that a motivating factor in your decision to provide abortion care?

ANSWER:	PERCENT:
YES	67.01%
NO	32.99%

3. Is the financial compensation you receive for providing abortion care sufficient to encourage you to continue providing that service?

ANSWER:	PERCENT:
YES	57.31%
NO	42.69%

1. Do you feel that abortion providers are respected in the medical community?

ANSWER:	PERCENT:
YES	30.80%
NO	69.20%

2. Have you ever felt ostracized because you provide abortion care?

ANSWER:	PERCENT:
YES	65.44%
NO	34.56%

3. Have you ever been verbally confronted by an anti-abortion physician?

ANSWER:	PERCENT:
YES	61.09%
NO	38.91%

4. Have you ever been denied hospital privileges because you provide abortion care?

ANSWER:	PERCENT:
YES	19.17%
NO	80.83%

5. Have you ever experienced problems recruiting or keeping nurses or other staff because you provide abortion care?

ANSWER:	PERCENT:
YES	48.15%
NO	51.85%

6. Does providing abortion care ever negatively impact your non-abortion practice?

ANSWER:	PERCENT:
YES	64.23%
NO	35.77%

7. Do you ever perceive that your prestige as a physician is damaged by being identified as an abortion provider?

ANSWER:	PERCENT:
YES	59.85%
NO	40.15%

8. Does being an abortion provider ever cause you to feel isolated from the rest of the medical community?

ANSWER:	PERCENT:
YES	50.75%
NO	49.25%

9. When you meet someone new, are you ever reluctant to say you provide abortion care?

ANSWER:	PERCENT:
YES	46.84%
NO	53.16%

10. Do you feel respected by those patients on whom you perform pregnancy terminations?

ANSWER:	PERCENT:
YES	86.84%
NO	13.16%

11. Do you feel that pro-choice organizations and politicians are doing enough to support those who provide abortion care?

ANSWER:	PERCENT:
YES	21.51%
NO	78.49%

12. Do you ever find providing abortion care to be boring or repetitious?

ANSWER:	PERCENT:
YES	31.20%
NO	68.80%

13. Do you perceive that there is a shortage of abortion providers?

ANSWER:	PERCENT:
YES	79.12%
NO	20.88%

14. Have you ever considered retiring from the practice of providing abortion care?

ANSWER:	PERCENT:
YES	52.40%
NO	47.60%

15. Would you be willing to train other physicians in abortion care?

ANSWER:	PERCENT:
YES	90.38%
NO	9.62%

16. Do you feel non-physicians should be allowed to perform abortions?

ANSWER:	PERCENT:
YES	21.03%
NO	78.97%

RELATED FINDINGS:

At this point, a comparison was done between the answers given to questions 16 and 13. This was done in order to determine whether a relationship exists between a respondent’s perception that there is a shortage of abortion providers, and their acceptance of, or opposition to, the idea that non-physicians should be allowed to perform abortions.

The survey showed that 75.83% of those who answered yes when asked if they thought there is a shortage of abortion providers (question 13), still answered no when asked if they felt that non-physicians should be allowed to perform abortions (question 16). Obviously, even abortion providers who say there is a shortage of physicians willing to perform abortions, do not believe that the field should be opened up to people who are not physicians.

The survey was also used to find out whether abortion providers differ on this “non-physician” issue based on whether they are wiling to perform late abortions or not. Since early abortions are less complicated, and therefore less risky, it would seem logical to assume that a higher percentage of “early-term” providers would approve of non-physicians being allowed to do abortions than would “late-term” providers. However, the results didn’t support that assumption. Even among respondents who said they would only perform first trimester abortions, 83.61% answered no to question 16. Surprisingly, this was actually a higher percentage than the total for all respondents.

17. Has any aspect of the abortion procedure ever caused you moral concern?

ANSWER:	PERCENT:
YES	37.73%
NO	62.27%

RELATED FINDINGS:

From a strictly subjective viewpoint, it seemed remarkable that almost 38% of abortion providers expressed moral concern over the abortion procedure, and it begged the question of whether anti-abortion activity plays a role in this seemingly high number.

Upon examination, the PROJECT CHOICE data seems to indicate that it does not. Of the respondents who said they had been the victim of anti-abortion harassment and/or violence, 35.59% also answered yes to question 17 in this section. The fact that there is such an insignificant difference between this figure and the one given by the group as a whole (37.73%), suggests that the moral concerns abortion providers have about performing abortions is an internal phenomenon brought on by the nature of the act itself, and are not directly related to anti-abortion activity.

This led to the question of whether those abortion providers who say they will only terminate a pregnancy in the first trimester, express moral misgivings at the same rate as those who do second and/or third trimester abortions. To answer that question, that group’s responses were out isolated and evaluated separately. Somewhat surprisingly, the results were that they actually had these concerns at a higher rate. The tabulations showed that providers who limit their practice to first trimester abortions answered yes to question 17 almost 10% more often than did the group as a whole.