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It sounds simple, but it's at the heart of how we approach health care at Planned Parenthood: Listen to patients — they are the experts on their own lives.
So many of the attacks on abortion ignore patients. These attacks simply disregard the lived experiences of millions of people. Patients' voices are silenced.
We must always remember to focus on and listen to the people who know best. Take a moment to learn about Nicole, a Planned Parenthood patient from Kentucky. When Nicole needed an abortion, she was forced to make an eight-hour drive across state lines from Kentucky to Indiana — and that was only the beginning.
Nicole was 33, working as a part-time bartender, and eight-and-a-half weeks pregnant. Once she made the decision to get an abortion, she realized she'd likely have to travel outside of Kentucky, where restrictive policies had forced all but one abortion provider at the time to shut down.
Nicole made the long drive from Louisville, KY to Bloomington, IN to get a safe and legal abortion at a Planned Parenthood health center.
But travel time and costs are just a few of the challenges that face patients who need to access vital abortion services. Many states also have arbitrary and medically unnecessary restrictions. These restrictions are meant to block patients' access to abortion — and by design, they put abortion out of reach for many people.
Indiana law, for example, requires patients to complete two unnecessary doctor's visits before they can get an abortion. For Nicole, that meant making the drive twice in just a matter of days during the early stages of her pregnancy.
Expenses quickly add up when you're forced to travel across states and secure time off of work. But logistics and financial burdens aren't the only strategies lawmakers use to put abortion out of reach. In Indiana, Nicole had to get an intrusive vaginal ultrasound — that has no medical purpose — and was forced to listen to state-sponsored anti-abortion propaganda. These barriers are designed to make patients change their minds about getting an abortion.
After her abortion, this is what Nicole had to say:
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