Medical abortion and manual vacuum aspiration for legal abortion protect women's health and reduce costs to the health system: findings from Colombia.

The majority of abortions in Colombia continue to take place outside the formal health system under a range of conditions, with the majority of women obtaining misoprostol from a thriving black market for the drug and self-administering the medication. We conducted a cost analysis to compare the costs to the health system of three approaches to the provision of abortion care in Colombia: post-abortion care for complications of unsafe abortions, and for legal abortions in a health facility, misoprostol-only medical abortion and vacuum aspiration abortion. Hospital billing records from three institutions, two large maternity hospitals and one specialist reproductive health clinic, were analysed for procedure and complication rates, and costs by diagnosis. The majority of visits (94%) were to the two hospitals for post-abortion care; the other 6% were for legal abortions. Only one minor complication was found among the women having legal abortions, a complication rate of less than 1%. Among the women presenting for post-abortion care, 5% had complications during their treatment, mainly from infection or haemorrhage. Legal abortions were associated not only with far fewer complications for women, but also lower costs for the health system than for post-abortion care. We calculated based on our findings that for every 1,000 women receiving post-abortion care instead of a legal abortion within the health system, 16 women experienced avoidable complications, and the health system spent US $48,000 managing them. Increasing women's access to safe abortion care would not only reduce complications for women, but would also be a cost-saving strategy for the health system.

Post-abortion and induced abortion services in two public hospitals in Colombia.

OBJECTIVE: Until 2006, legal induced abortion was completely banned in Colombia. Few facilities are equipped or willing to offer abortion services; often adolescents experience even greater barriers of access in this context. We examined post abortion care (PAC) and legal induced abortion in two large public hospitals. We tested the association of hospital site, procedure type (manual vacuum aspiration vs. sharp curettage), and age (adolescents vs. women 20 years and over) with service type (PAC or legal induced abortion). STUDY DESIGN: Retrospective cohort study using 2010 billing data routinely collected for reimbursement (N=1353 procedures). We utilized descriptive statistics, multivariable logistic regression and predicted probabilities. RESULTS: Adolescents made up 22% of the overall sample (300/1353). Manual vacuum aspiration was used in one-third of cases (vs. sharp curettage). Adolescents had lower odds of documented PAC (vs. induced abortion) compared with women over age 20 (OR=0.42; 95% CI=0.21-0.86). The absolute difference of service type by age, however, is very small, controlling for hospital site and procedure type (.97 probability of PAC for adolescents compared with .99 for women 20 and over). Regardless of age, PAC via sharp curettage is the current standard in these two public hospitals. CONCLUSION: Both adolescents and women over 20 are in need of access to legal abortion services utilizing modern technologies in the public sector in Colombia. Documentation of abortion care is an essential first step to determining barriers to access and opportunities for quality improvement and better health outcomes for women. IMPLICATIONS: Following partial decriminalization of abortion in Colombia, in public hospitals nearly all abortion services are post-abortion care, not induced abortion. Sharp curettage is the dominant treatment for both adolescents and women over 20. Women seek care in the public sector for abortion, and must have access to safe, quality services.

Tratamiento de la infección por herpes simple: efecto de la procaína infiltrada sobre las lesiones recurrentes del herpes labial / Effect of submucosal infiltration of recurrent herpes labialis lesions

El objetivo del estudio fue establecer el efecto de la procaína infiltrada en el tiempo de cicatrización de las lesiones recurrentes del herpes simple labial. Se incluyeron 30 pacientes, 20 mujeres y 30 hombres. Todos presentaban lesiones establecidas de herpes labial (estado vesicular) con máximo dos días de evolución y 22 presentaron haber presentado lesiones recurrentes previas. Los pacientes fueron evaluados clínicamente y la información referente a la historia y evolución de las lesiones fue registrada en un formulario. Las lesiones se infiltraron con 1.8 ml de procaína al 1 por ciento y se hizo un seguimiento cada 24 horas hasta la cicatrización de las mismas. Esta información fue comparada con el comportamiento clínico y tiempo de cicatrización habitual de las lesiones relatado por los pacientes, además con la comparación de con los resultados de otros estudios los cuales evalúan diferentes agentes terapéuticos para las lesiones recurrentes del herpes labial.

Informe sobre un caso de pancreatectomia total por trauma: soporte metabolico / Report of one case of total pancreatectomy after trauma: metabolic support

La pancreatectomia total por trauma tiene una muy alta incidencia de complicaciones y una elevada tasa de mortalidad; y el manejo posterior de un paciente pancreatectomizado constituye un reto clinico y terapeutico. En el presente caso no habia alternativa quirurgica, dada la magnitud del trauma. El exito del tratamiento se debio a la buena tecnica quirurgica, al refinado cuidado del estado critico postoperatorio y al manejo metabolico moderno acorde con el buen entendimiento de los procesos metabolicos como respuesta al trauma. Se presentan pautas de manejo que pueden servir de guia para el cuidado de pacientes con estres por trauma, y por cirugia de similar magnitud.