OB-GYN residencies partner with out-of-state programs to provide abortion training
Wisconsin OB-GYN residency programs are forging connections with out-of-state medical schools to meet accreditation requirements and ensure residents have a comprehensive family planning education.
UW Health is working with the University of Chicago “to provide UW Health OB-GYN residents access to a family planning and abortion services educational rotation in that state,” according to a statement.
The Medical College of Wisconsin partnered with Rush University Medical Center in Chicago, said Dr. Kate Dielentheis, an MCW assistant professor and associate program director of its OB-GYN residency program.
An 1849 state law makes it a felony for doctors to provide abortion except to save the life of a pregnant person. Attorney General Josh Kaul has filed a lawsuit seeking to render the law unenforceable.
“From a medical perspective, this kind of healthcare is incredibly important,” Dielentheis said. “We would never recommend that residents do anything they are questioning could be a felony, and so we send them to a place where it’s not.”
The Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education requires all accredited OB-GYN graduate medical programs to offer or help students get clinical exposure to the provision of abortions, according to the requirements’ most recent revision. Residents with moral or religious objections do not have to participate.
The accreditation revision also states, “If a program is in a jurisdiction where resident access to this clinical experience is unlawful, the program must provide access to this clinical experience in a different jurisdiction where it is lawful.”
At a Wisconsin Health News event last month, MCW CEO Dr. John Raymond said relocating residents to a partner school is “not that easy” due to high expenses and logistical concerns. At MCW, residents visit Rush for two to three weeks at a time, according to Dielentheis.
Despite these concerns, Dr. Sloane York, an associate professor and the program director of the OB-GYN residency program at Rush University Medical Group, said Illinois’ increase in patients seeking abortion and the eagerness of MCW residents can benefit Rush.
“It’s been easy to integrate them into our clinic space,” York said. “It’s really valuable for our residents to hear the hurdles that (MCW) residents are going through.”
Raymond also addressed the state’s OB-GYN shortage while confronting the abortion restrictions.
“There is certainly a cadre of pro-life individuals that would be attracted to a state like Wisconsin (for OB-GYN residency), but a larger number that aren’t,” he said.
He’d like to see a more straightforward interpretation of Wisconsin’s abortion law.
“Clarity in our laws here in the state of Wisconsin is absolutely necessary,” Raymond said. “And we don’t have it.”
– Elizabeth Casolo for Wisconsin Health News
