Caitlin Gerdts
Biographic Data
| ID | 378358 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Caitlin Gerdts |
| GIVEN NAMES | Caitlin |
| FAMILY NAME | Gerdts |
| SIGNATURE | GERDTS C |
| AFFILIATIONS | Ibis Reproductive Health |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-2488-5072 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 27 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 35 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 27 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2002 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 4 |
Self-Managed Medication Abortion
Self-managed abortion (SMA) represents a significant shift in the abortion landscape, offering an alternative to facility-based care via the medication misoprostol with or without mifepristone. The World Health Organization recommends SMA with medications as safe and effective up to 12 weeks’ gestation and with access to information and health system referrals. Increasing prevalence of SMA can be attributed to a range of factors, including legal …
I Was Confident From the Bottom of My Heart That I Will be Fine With These Medicines ”
While the incidence of self‐managed abortion (SMA) in India is well‐documented, why the majority of abortions in India are self‐managed remains largely unanswered. This qualitative study explores factors that contribute to decision‐making about SMA in India. Between January and August 2022, we conducted 43 in‐depth interviews with people who self‐managed abortions across six Indian states, recruiting via accredited social health activists, clinic…
To be vigilant to leave no trace’
Until 2018, abortion in the Republic of Ireland was banned in almost all circumstances under one of the most restrictive legal regimes in Europe. The main solution for Irish women and pregnant people seeking abortion services had been to pursue care abroad, typically in clinics in England. In this paper we focus on the hardships of waiting for abortion care experienced by Irish residents leading up to their travel for appointments in England in 2…
Utilización de dos modelos en la atención al aborto en Argentina pre-Ley 27.610
OBJETIVO: Explorar la utilización de dos modelos para la atención al aborto en Argentina en el período 2016-2019: abortos con proveedores de servicios médicos privados proderechos y abortos acompañados (vía autogestión y vía instituciones de salud); y comparar el perfil de quiénes acceden a estos modelos y cuándo. MÉTODOS: Utilizamos datos de sistematizaciones de colectivas de acompañamiento en Socorristas en Red y de proveedores de servicios pri…
The first difficulty is time
Drawing on qualitative and quantitative data collected during a 5-year multi-disciplinary European research project, in this article we show how restrictions on access to legal abortion, and particularly gestational age (GA) limits at the end of the first trimester of pregnancy, negatively affect women and pregnant people living in European countries where abortion is legal on request or on broad grounds. First, we examine why most European legis…
Beyond safety
Effectiveness of self-managed abortion during the Covid-19 pandemic
Globally, restrictions imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic altered access to clinical abortion care, as well as people’s ability to access abortion medications on their own. When clinical care is inaccessible, or when self-care is preferred, people use pills on their own, without clinical supervision, to end their pregnancies–a practice known as “self-managed” abortion. Little is known about experiences of self-managed abortion during the COVID-19 p…
What constitutes a good healthcare experience for unintended pregnancy? A qualitative study among young people in California
Little is known about young people's experiences accessing healthcare for unintended pregnancy in the USA. To address this gap, we conducted in-depth interviews with 25 young people in California who had experienced at least one unintended pregnancy at or before 25 years of age. Participants were asked about their interactions with healthcare providers during the pregnancy, their thoughts on the determinants of their perceived quality of care, an…
Collapse of the Abortion Care Infrastructure
Impact of Clinic Closures on Women Obtaining Abortion Services After Implementation of a Restrictive Law in Texas
OBJECTIVES: To evaluate the additional burdens experienced by Texas abortion patients whose nearest in-state clinic was one of more than half of facilities providing abortion that had closed after the introduction of House Bill 2 in 2013. METHODS: In mid-2014, we surveyed Texas-resident women seeking abortions in 10 Texas facilities (n = 398), including both Planned Parenthood-affiliated clinics and independent providers that performed more than …
Socioeconomic Outcomes of Women Who Receive and Women Who Are Denied Wanted Abortions in the United States
Socioeconomic Outcomes of Women Who Receive and Women Who Are Denied Wanted Abortions in the United States D. G. FosterPhD, M. A. BiggsPhD, L. RalphPhD, MPH, C. GerdtsPhD, MHS, S. RobertsDrPH, and M. M. GlymourScD, MS CopyRight https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2017.304247r Published Online: August 15, 2022
Understanding the Abortion Experiences of Young People to Inform Quality Care in Argentina, Bangladesh, Ethiopia, and Nigeria
Young people face social and structural barriers when accessing abortions. High-quality, sexual and reproductive healthcare is needed; however, literature on youth-informed abortion services is limited. This study assesses accounts of youth who obtained an abortion in Argentina, Bangladesh, Ethiopia, and Nigeria and provides recommendations to improve person-centered aspects of abortion quality. We analyzed 48 semi-structured interviews with clie…
Abortion information governance and women's travels across European borders
The World Health Organization considers the provision of information about safe, legal abortion essential for good-quality abortion care, but the question remains about who is responsible for providing information to people whose needs are not met in their own countries. Using data from a mixed-method research conducted with women travelling from France, Germany, Italy, and Ireland to seek abortion care in the UK, the Netherland, and Spain, we ma…
Requests for medication abortion support in Brazil during and after the Zika epidemic
Brazil declared a public health emergency during the Zika virus epidemic, recommending avoiding pregnancy. This study analyses requests received by Women Help Women for information about and support for self-managed medication abortion (MA) in Brazil during and after the Zika epidemic to understand how Zika may have impacted requests to the service. This analysis considered 20,609 requests for MA support received between January 2016 and June 201…
Dualities between Tunisian provider beliefs and actions in abortion care
Despite Tunisia's historically progressive reproductive health policies, Tunisian women now face significant challenges accessing legal abortion. Through in-depth interviews with providers at six facilities, we explored factors influencing provider attitudes about abortion and provider perspectives about abortion morality, safety, and legality. We found that gatekeepers (counsellors and front office staff) generally believed abortion was immoral,…
Global, regional, and subregional classification of abortions by safety, 2010–14
BACKGROUND: Global estimates of unsafe abortions have been produced for 1995, 2003, and 2008. However, reconceptualisation of the framework and methods for estimating abortion safety is needed owing to the increased availability of simple methods for safe abortion (eg, medical abortion), the increasingly widespread use of misoprostol outside formal health systems in contexts where abortion is legally restricted, and the need to account for the mu…
Gerdts et al. Respond
Gerdts et al. Respond Affiliation Caitlin Gerdts PhD, MHS, Liza Fuentes PhD, MPH, Daniel Grossman MD, Kari White PhD, MPH, Brianna Keefe-Oates MPH, Sarah E. Baum MPH, Kristine Hopkins PhD, Chandler W. Stolp PhD, and Joseph E. Potter PhDCaitlin Gerdts, Brianna Keefe-Oates, and Sarah E. Baum are with Ibis Reproductive Health, Oakland, CA. Liza Fuentes is with the Guttmacher Institute, New York, NY. Daniel Grossman is with Advancing New Standards in…
The List Experiment for Measuring Abortion
Measuring abortion incidence and prevalence is often difficult because of under‐reporting and other biases, complicated research designs, and other issues. Recently, family planning researchers have introduced a new method called the list experiment, adopted from political science and economics, to measure abortion. Three completed studies and at least four studies currently underway use this method to measure abortion in several countries. We di…
Abortion incidence between 1990 and 2014
Conscientious objection to abortion provision
Conscientious objection to abortion - a clinician's refusal to perform abortions because of moral or religious beliefs - is a limited right, intended to protect clinicians' convictions while maintaining abortion access. This paper argues that conscientious objection policies and debates around the world generally do not take into account the social, political, and economic pressures that profoundly influence clinicians who must decide whether to …
Quality of Care in a Safe-Abortion Hotline in Indonesia
Objectives. To examine services offered by safe-abortion hotlines in contexts in which abortion is legally restricted and to document the experiences of women contacting a safe-abortion hotline in Indonesia. Methods. We analyzed 1829 first-time contacts to a safe-abortion hotline in Indonesia as a part of routine service provision between January 1, 2012 and December 31, 2014. Results. Nearly one third (29.9%) of initial contacts reported their a…
Side Effects, Physical Health Consequences, and Mortality Associated with Abortion and Birth after an Unwanted Pregnancy
These results reinforce the existing data on the safety of induced abortion when compared with childbirth, and highlight the risk of serious morbidity and mortality associated with childbirth after unwanted pregnancy
Does state-level context matter for individuals' knowledge about abortion, legality and health? Challenging the ‘red states v. blue states’ hypothesis
Recently, the hypothesis that state-level political context influences individuals' cultural values--the 'red states v. blue states' hypothesis--has been invoked to explain the hyper-polarisation of politics in the USA. To test this hypothesis, we examined individuals' knowledge about abortion in relation to the political context of their current state of residence. Drawing from an internet-survey of 586 reproductive-age individuals in the USA, w…
Radical or routine? Nurse practitioners, nurse-midwives, and physician assistants as abortion providers
In 2013 California passed legislation that expanded the pool of eligible aspiration abortion providers to include advanced practice nurses, nurse-midwives, and physician-assistants. This law, enacted in 2014, is based on evidence generated by the Health Workforce Pilot Project #171, which examined the safety and effectiveness of aspiration abortion care provided by these clinicians as well as patient acceptability and satisfaction. This evidence …
An innovative approach to measuring maternal mortality at the community level in low-resource settings using mid-level providers
This paper proposes a new, community-based approach to the measurement of maternal mortality, and presents results from a feasibility study in 2010–11 of that approach in rural Tigray, Ethiopia. The study was implemented in three health posts and one health centre with a total catchment area of approximately 22,000 people. Priests, traditional birth attendants and community-based reproductive health agents were responsible for locating and report…
Impact of Clinic Closures on Women Obtaining Abortion Services After Implementation of a Restrictive Law in Texas
OBJECTIVES: To evaluate the additional burdens experienced by Texas abortion patients whose nearest in-state clinic was one of more than half of facilities providing abortion that had closed after the introduction of House Bill 2 in 2013. METHODS: In mid-2014, we surveyed Texas-resident women seeking abortions in 10 Texas facilities (n = 398), including both Planned Parenthood-affiliated clinics and independent providers that performed more than …
The List Experiment for Measuring Abortion
Measuring abortion incidence and prevalence is often difficult because of under‐reporting and other biases, complicated research designs, and other issues. Recently, family planning researchers have introduced a new method called the list experiment, adopted from political science and economics, to measure abortion. Three completed studies and at least four studies currently underway use this method to measure abortion in several countries. We di…
The first difficulty is time
Drawing on qualitative and quantitative data collected during a 5-year multi-disciplinary European research project, in this article we show how restrictions on access to legal abortion, and particularly gestational age (GA) limits at the end of the first trimester of pregnancy, negatively affect women and pregnant people living in European countries where abortion is legal on request or on broad grounds. First, we examine why most European legis…
Quality of Care in a Safe-Abortion Hotline in Indonesia
Objectives. To examine services offered by safe-abortion hotlines in contexts in which abortion is legally restricted and to document the experiences of women contacting a safe-abortion hotline in Indonesia. Methods. We analyzed 1829 first-time contacts to a safe-abortion hotline in Indonesia as a part of routine service provision between January 1, 2012 and December 31, 2014. Results. Nearly one third (29.9%) of initial contacts reported their a…
Socioeconomic Outcomes of Women Who Receive and Women Who Are Denied Wanted Abortions in the United States
Socioeconomic Outcomes of Women Who Receive and Women Who Are Denied Wanted Abortions in the United States D. G. FosterPhD, M. A. BiggsPhD, L. RalphPhD, MPH, C. GerdtsPhD, MHS, S. RobertsDrPH, and M. M. GlymourScD, MS CopyRight https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2017.304247r Published Online: August 15, 2022
Abortion information governance and women's travels across European borders
The World Health Organization considers the provision of information about safe, legal abortion essential for good-quality abortion care, but the question remains about who is responsible for providing information to people whose needs are not met in their own countries. Using data from a mixed-method research conducted with women travelling from France, Germany, Italy, and Ireland to seek abortion care in the UK, the Netherland, and Spain, we ma…
An innovative approach to measuring maternal mortality at the community level in low-resource settings using mid-level providers
This paper proposes a new, community-based approach to the measurement of maternal mortality, and presents results from a feasibility study in 2010–11 of that approach in rural Tigray, Ethiopia. The study was implemented in three health posts and one health centre with a total catchment area of approximately 22,000 people. Priests, traditional birth attendants and community-based reproductive health agents were responsible for locating and report…
Universal sexuality education in Mongolia
This issue of Quality/Calidad/Qualité demonstrates how Mongolia developed a national plan to a provide a comprehensive sexual and reproductive health curriculum and media for adolescents. Among the lessons learned from the Mongolian experience were the following: 1) questions about unwanted sexual relations and sexual roles were the most pressing among adolescents, especially girls; 2) printed media are efficient and inexpensive; and 3) parental …
Poverty, Gender Inequities, and Women's Risk of Human Immunodeficiency Virus/Aids
Entrenched economic and gender inequities together are driving a globally expanding, increasingly female, human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)/AIDS epidemic. To date, significant population‐level declines in HIV transmission have not been observed, at least in part because most approaches to prevention have presumed a degree of individual control in decision making that does not speak to the reality of women's and girls' circumstances in many parts…
An innovative approach to measuring maternal mortality at the community level in low-resource settings using mid-level providers
This paper proposes a new, community-based approach to the measurement of maternal mortality, and presents results from a feasibility study in 2010–11 of that approach in rural Tigray, Ethiopia. The study was implemented in three health posts and one health centre with a total catchment area of approximately 22,000 people. Priests, traditional birth attendants and community-based reproductive health agents were responsible for locating and report…
Side Effects, Physical Health Consequences, and Mortality Associated with Abortion and Birth after an Unwanted Pregnancy
These results reinforce the existing data on the safety of induced abortion when compared with childbirth, and highlight the risk of serious morbidity and mortality associated with childbirth after unwanted pregnancy
Does state-level context matter for individuals' knowledge about abortion, legality and health? Challenging the ‘red states v. blue states’ hypothesis
Recently, the hypothesis that state-level political context influences individuals' cultural values--the 'red states v. blue states' hypothesis--has been invoked to explain the hyper-polarisation of politics in the USA. To test this hypothesis, we examined individuals' knowledge about abortion in relation to the political context of their current state of residence. Drawing from an internet-survey of 586 reproductive-age individuals in the USA, w…
Radical or routine? Nurse practitioners, nurse-midwives, and physician assistants as abortion providers
In 2013 California passed legislation that expanded the pool of eligible aspiration abortion providers to include advanced practice nurses, nurse-midwives, and physician-assistants. This law, enacted in 2014, is based on evidence generated by the Health Workforce Pilot Project #171, which examined the safety and effectiveness of aspiration abortion care provided by these clinicians as well as patient acceptability and satisfaction. This evidence …
Abortion incidence between 1990 and 2014
Conscientious objection to abortion provision
Conscientious objection to abortion - a clinician's refusal to perform abortions because of moral or religious beliefs - is a limited right, intended to protect clinicians' convictions while maintaining abortion access. This paper argues that conscientious objection policies and debates around the world generally do not take into account the social, political, and economic pressures that profoundly influence clinicians who must decide whether to …
Quality of Care in a Safe-Abortion Hotline in Indonesia
Objectives. To examine services offered by safe-abortion hotlines in contexts in which abortion is legally restricted and to document the experiences of women contacting a safe-abortion hotline in Indonesia. Methods. We analyzed 1829 first-time contacts to a safe-abortion hotline in Indonesia as a part of routine service provision between January 1, 2012 and December 31, 2014. Results. Nearly one third (29.9%) of initial contacts reported their a…
Global, regional, and subregional classification of abortions by safety, 2010–14
BACKGROUND: Global estimates of unsafe abortions have been produced for 1995, 2003, and 2008. However, reconceptualisation of the framework and methods for estimating abortion safety is needed owing to the increased availability of simple methods for safe abortion (eg, medical abortion), the increasingly widespread use of misoprostol outside formal health systems in contexts where abortion is legally restricted, and the need to account for the mu…
Gerdts et al. Respond
Gerdts et al. Respond Affiliation Caitlin Gerdts PhD, MHS, Liza Fuentes PhD, MPH, Daniel Grossman MD, Kari White PhD, MPH, Brianna Keefe-Oates MPH, Sarah E. Baum MPH, Kristine Hopkins PhD, Chandler W. Stolp PhD, and Joseph E. Potter PhDCaitlin Gerdts, Brianna Keefe-Oates, and Sarah E. Baum are with Ibis Reproductive Health, Oakland, CA. Liza Fuentes is with the Guttmacher Institute, New York, NY. Daniel Grossman is with Advancing New Standards in…
The List Experiment for Measuring Abortion
Measuring abortion incidence and prevalence is often difficult because of under‐reporting and other biases, complicated research designs, and other issues. Recently, family planning researchers have introduced a new method called the list experiment, adopted from political science and economics, to measure abortion. Three completed studies and at least four studies currently underway use this method to measure abortion in several countries. We di…
Dualities between Tunisian provider beliefs and actions in abortion care
Despite Tunisia's historically progressive reproductive health policies, Tunisian women now face significant challenges accessing legal abortion. Through in-depth interviews with providers at six facilities, we explored factors influencing provider attitudes about abortion and provider perspectives about abortion morality, safety, and legality. We found that gatekeepers (counsellors and front office staff) generally believed abortion was immoral,…
Requests for medication abortion support in Brazil during and after the Zika epidemic
Brazil declared a public health emergency during the Zika virus epidemic, recommending avoiding pregnancy. This study analyses requests received by Women Help Women for information about and support for self-managed medication abortion (MA) in Brazil during and after the Zika epidemic to understand how Zika may have impacted requests to the service. This analysis considered 20,609 requests for MA support received between January 2016 and June 201…
Abortion information governance and women's travels across European borders
The World Health Organization considers the provision of information about safe, legal abortion essential for good-quality abortion care, but the question remains about who is responsible for providing information to people whose needs are not met in their own countries. Using data from a mixed-method research conducted with women travelling from France, Germany, Italy, and Ireland to seek abortion care in the UK, the Netherland, and Spain, we ma…
Beyond safety
Effectiveness of self-managed abortion during the Covid-19 pandemic
Globally, restrictions imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic altered access to clinical abortion care, as well as people’s ability to access abortion medications on their own. When clinical care is inaccessible, or when self-care is preferred, people use pills on their own, without clinical supervision, to end their pregnancies–a practice known as “self-managed” abortion. Little is known about experiences of self-managed abortion during the COVID-19 p…
What constitutes a good healthcare experience for unintended pregnancy? A qualitative study among young people in California
Little is known about young people's experiences accessing healthcare for unintended pregnancy in the USA. To address this gap, we conducted in-depth interviews with 25 young people in California who had experienced at least one unintended pregnancy at or before 25 years of age. Participants were asked about their interactions with healthcare providers during the pregnancy, their thoughts on the determinants of their perceived quality of care, an…
Collapse of the Abortion Care Infrastructure
Impact of Clinic Closures on Women Obtaining Abortion Services After Implementation of a Restrictive Law in Texas
OBJECTIVES: To evaluate the additional burdens experienced by Texas abortion patients whose nearest in-state clinic was one of more than half of facilities providing abortion that had closed after the introduction of House Bill 2 in 2013. METHODS: In mid-2014, we surveyed Texas-resident women seeking abortions in 10 Texas facilities (n = 398), including both Planned Parenthood-affiliated clinics and independent providers that performed more than …
Socioeconomic Outcomes of Women Who Receive and Women Who Are Denied Wanted Abortions in the United States
Socioeconomic Outcomes of Women Who Receive and Women Who Are Denied Wanted Abortions in the United States D. G. FosterPhD, M. A. BiggsPhD, L. RalphPhD, MPH, C. GerdtsPhD, MHS, S. RobertsDrPH, and M. M. GlymourScD, MS CopyRight https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2017.304247r Published Online: August 15, 2022
Understanding the Abortion Experiences of Young People to Inform Quality Care in Argentina, Bangladesh, Ethiopia, and Nigeria
Young people face social and structural barriers when accessing abortions. High-quality, sexual and reproductive healthcare is needed; however, literature on youth-informed abortion services is limited. This study assesses accounts of youth who obtained an abortion in Argentina, Bangladesh, Ethiopia, and Nigeria and provides recommendations to improve person-centered aspects of abortion quality. We analyzed 48 semi-structured interviews with clie…
To be vigilant to leave no trace’
Until 2018, abortion in the Republic of Ireland was banned in almost all circumstances under one of the most restrictive legal regimes in Europe. The main solution for Irish women and pregnant people seeking abortion services had been to pursue care abroad, typically in clinics in England. In this paper we focus on the hardships of waiting for abortion care experienced by Irish residents leading up to their travel for appointments in England in 2…
Utilización de dos modelos en la atención al aborto en Argentina pre-Ley 27.610
OBJETIVO: Explorar la utilización de dos modelos para la atención al aborto en Argentina en el período 2016-2019: abortos con proveedores de servicios médicos privados proderechos y abortos acompañados (vía autogestión y vía instituciones de salud); y comparar el perfil de quiénes acceden a estos modelos y cuándo. MÉTODOS: Utilizamos datos de sistematizaciones de colectivas de acompañamiento en Socorristas en Red y de proveedores de servicios pri…
The first difficulty is time
Drawing on qualitative and quantitative data collected during a 5-year multi-disciplinary European research project, in this article we show how restrictions on access to legal abortion, and particularly gestational age (GA) limits at the end of the first trimester of pregnancy, negatively affect women and pregnant people living in European countries where abortion is legal on request or on broad grounds. First, we examine why most European legis…
Medicine (25 works) · Reproductive Health and Contraception (23 works) · Abortion (22 works) · Pregnancy (22 works) · Environmental health (15 works) · Population (14 works) · Political science (12 works) · Family medicine (11 works) · Nursing (11 works) · Demography (9 works)