ABSTRACT
The first documented use of telemedicine in US abortion care was in Iowa in 2008, where it was used to extend the reach of the small number of physicians willing to provide medication abortion there.1 Because of regulations imposed by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), patients still needed to come into a medical office to receive the mifepristone, used together with misoprostol. In the first 16 months of the service, 33% of medication abortions at a Planned Parenthood affiliate in Iowa were provided using telemedicine.1 This proportion increased overtime, and data from the affiliate spanning seven years after the service was introduced demonstrated that 46% of medication abortions were provided using telemedicine.2 Research on this modelof providing telemedicine found it to be safe and effective, with a high level of satisfaction among patients.1,2 In our previous article,3 we found that in the two years after the model was introdi iced, there was a small but significant decline in second-trimester abortion. Overall, our findings s ıggested that telemedicine improved access to medication abortion and to early abortion generally. Since our article was published, there has been a rapid expansion of the use of telemedicine in all aspects of medicine, including for abortion care.