Dobbs decision will rob many medical students of training on abortion care

As medical students — the next generation of physicians — we believe that the Supreme Court’s Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health decision, which overturns Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey, undermines the health of our future patients and our ability to become competent physicians.

As M.D. candidates in our second year of training, we are still learning the fundamental skills of being a physician while exploring the range of medical specialties. This period of medical school is focused on building a foundation of both knowledge and relationship-building skills that will be essential to the practice of medicine regardless of specialty. Students who do not participate in comprehensive sexual and reproductive education, including education about abortion, will be unable to navigate some of the complex medical and social challenges their patients will encounter.

Medical students who are trained in family planning counseling, including discussing abortion options, learn how to engage in difficult conversations with patients while providing support and communicating pertinent medical knowledge. Pregnant people seek abortion for many reasons, from life-threatening complications to socioeconomic barriers, providing for other children in an already struggling family, or a desire to remain in school as they build their own futures. Each patient’s life is unique, and the care provided to them must be adjusted to align with their needs, wants, and life circumstances. This is true not just for abortion care but for care in every clinical specialty.

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By learning how to have these conversations through abortion training, medical students improve on metrics of respect for patient privacy and autonomy, professionalism, and humanism, which are core competencies of medical education established by the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC). Education about abortion challenges students’ existing perspectives and encourages them to question their biases about the reasons patients seek care and to respect their patients’ autonomy.

In a post-Roe era, medical students in states with highly restrictive abortion laws will not learn comprehensive reproductive health care. Conversations about sexual health are an important component of medical training in part because they are difficult. Abortion care necessitates confronting conflicting ideals and working with patients to provide treatment that is both grounded in evidence-based medicine and best meets their wants and needs. Sexual and reproductive health, including management of pregnancy complications and termination options, is universal, as well as deeply personal. Medical students who learn abortion care learn to build patient-physician trust and reinforce the shared humanity that is the cornerstone of medical care.

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