Education on abortion pill reversal is empowering for women

In 2007, an incredible medical advancement happened: Dr. Matthew Harrison saved the first preborn baby with abortion pill reversal. Several years later, Dr. George Delgado established the Abortion Pill Reversal hotline, staffed 24/7 by nurses and medical professionals with a network of over 300 physicians around the world — a far cry from the technique’s humble beginnings.

Abortion pill reversal works to counteract RU-486, or medication abortions. A woman first takes mifepristone, which blocks progesterone from reaching the placenta. This causes the placenta to break down, essentially starving the baby of oxygen and nutrients. After 48 hours, if the abortion has not been completed — if the woman has not expelled the body of her dead baby — she then takes misoprostol, which induces labor, causing her to expel the placenta and the baby. After two weeks, she is supposed to return to the abortion facility to make sure that nothing remains of the baby in her uterus. In the video below, former abortionist Dr. Anthony Levatino explains:

1st Trimester Medical Abortion: Abortion Pills

So how does abortion pill reversal work? Dr. Karen Poehailos is a board-certified family physician who has successfully saved at least one baby through abortion pill reversal, and spoke to Live Action News about the process.

“What we’re doing is giving a lot of progesterone to compete with the progesterone receptors in the uterus. We try to send in more progesterone in so it out-competes the mifepristone. The patient I worked with had very good levels of progesterone to begin with, so that worked in her favor,” she explained. “The first ultrasound showed an area of hemorrhage inside the placenta, and she did have some bleeding, but the ultrasound showed the baby was alive. Over the next couple of shots through the next couple of days, that area disappeared. The progesterone was able to counteract the mifepristone and allow the placenta to heal itself. I think if we hadn’t given her that… well, she may not have completed the abortion on her own, but she was bleeding and the placenta was breaking down, and we saw it on the ultrasound. It wasn’t medical theater; it was reality.”

But as abortion pill reversal has begun to spread and gain more attention, and more and more women have sought to save the lives of their preborn babies after an attempted abortion, the abortion industry has reacted, attempting to discredit the process and keep women from knowing that it is even possible. One such battle is brewing in California.

READ: Idaho’s abortion pill reversal law could save babies like Cruz and Zechariah

In 2012, Heartbeat International was approved as a Continuing Education Provider by the California State Board of Registered Nursing, and also began offering an abortion pill reversal course online. In 2013, Heartbeat began offering a continuing education unit credit for abortion pill reversal at its annual conference. But in 2016, the board began receiving pressure from the abortion industry and pro-abortion media outlets, and the war against abortion pill reversal in California began.

In the beginning of 2016, Heartbeat International found out it was being audited by the board of nursing, and by the summer of next year, the board told Heartbeat International it could resume offering all courses, including abortion pill reversal courses. But on September 11, Heartbeat was notified that it must discontinue offering abortion pill reversal courses, or risk losing their status — a decision that the pro-abortion site Rewire announced on its website three days before Heartbeat International was notified, Director of Communications Jay Hobbs told Live Action News. By December, the board reversed course again, and Heartbeat International was again allowed to resume offering courses.

But last month, the board came up with a new tactic: proposing a regulation for “relevant to the practice of nursing.” Under this regulation, abortion pill reversal courses would be banned. This decision would not just affect California health care professionals, but would have nationwide implications, as all 50 states accept CEU credit from California providers.

Heartbeat International has responded by launching a petition calling on the board to stand up to the abortion lobby, and allow nurses to learn about abortion pill reversal. The petition has received thousands of signatures so far.

Hobbs explained that while doctors are the ones to actually perform the procedure, nurses must be empowered to be educated on abortion pill reversal so they are better able to care for their patients. A nurse well-educated in abortion pill reversal will be able to help guide a patient if she has begun the abortion process and is having second thoughts, just as nurses frequently have to counsel and guide their patients on other medical procedures. He also stressed the importance of using the correct terminology. The pro-abortion media has taken to running articles claiming to debunk the theory of abortion reversal, which Hobbs says is intentional. “Dropping the ‘pill’ is an intentional move from the abortion lobby to slam APR since, obviously, there’s no reversing a completed abortion, as simply ‘abortion reversal’ implies,” he explained. By labeling it as abortion reversal rather than using the correct term — abortion pill reversal — it’s a subtle way of discrediting the people who advocate for its usage, as well as the process itself.

Hundreds of babies have already been saved by abortion pill reversal, and that number will only grow with time. But if the California State Board of Registered Nursing chooses to buckle to pressure from the abortion industry, they will be failing their patients — both in the state of California, and across the country. Women need to know that abortion pill reversal is possible, and nurses must be empowered to help them.

Sign the petition now and demand that nurses be allowed to learn about abortion pill reversal.

Editor’s Note, 7/30/24: This article has been updated to remove links and references to a study that is no longer published at the referenced links.