WOMEN are being exposed to greater health risks, pain and distress because of "unacceptable" waits of more than five weeks for an abortion, doctors warned last night.
A Scotland on Sunday investigation has revealed that at least five health boards are failing to perform terminations within the recommended waiting time limit of three weeks from referral.
In some areas, women are being forced to wait up to 36 da
ys before the distressing procedure can be carried out.
A hard-hitting report by the health watchdog, NHS Quality Improvement Scotland, has also strongly criticised boards for failing to provide quick enough access to abortion clinics.
The length of the waits has fuelled the ethical debate about whether foetuses can feel pain during a termination. Long delays mean foetuses will be far more developed than when the decision to abort was first made.
But anti-abortion campaigners fear reducing the waiting time limit will deny women the chance to reconsider their decision to undergo the procedure.
Under guidelines produced by the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, which have been adopted by the Scottish Executive, "no woman should wait for more than three weeks from first referral".
But figures obtained from health boards reveal that women face a postcode lottery when trying to organise an abortion.
While in some areas the maximum wait in the past year has been just seven days, NHS Forth Valley reported the longest wait of 36 days, more than five weeks.
Patients in the Borders and Lanarkshire had to wait as long as 33 days for an abortion while those in Fife were forced to wait up to 26 days, four days outside the three-week target. NHS Highland's longest wait was 25 days. Grampian, which also performs Shetland's abortion procedures, had delays of up to 21 days - the limit set out in official guidelines.
In a new report on sexual health services, NHS Quality Improvement Scotland slammed the health boards for their performance.
It said: "Referral for abortion can involve unacceptable delays in some parts of Scotland. The risks of induced abortion rise with increasing gestation, and waiting for weeks once a decision has been made is distressing."
NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde was unable to provide figures for its longest wait due to an administrative error. The area's average waiting time was six days.
Dumfries and Galloway and Orkney health boards both failed to provide any figures.
Tayside was the best performing health board with patients waiting a maximum of one week, while Lothian and Ayrshire and Arran both managed to perform all procedures within two weeks.
Last night doctors insisted it was essential that terminations were carried out promptly after a woman had decided they did not want to have their baby.
Under abortion law, women can seek an abortion up to 24 weeks into the pregnancy.
Within the first nine weeks of pregnancy women can have either a medical abortion, whereby they take two pills that cause them to miscarry, or a surgical abortion. After nine weeks, women must have a surgical abortion under general anaesthetic.
Dr Anna Glasier, a consultant obstetrician at Edinburgh Royal Infirmary and a member of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, said:
"If having made the decision and been to see a doctor, women have to wait two weeks to see somebody at the hospital and two weeks to have the pregnancy terminated, it is an extremely distressing situation.
"The risks of abortion increase significantly with every week of gestation. You are more likely to experience haemorrhage, damage to the neck of the womb and blood clots the further on you are."
But last night anti-abortion campaigners insisted women should not be rushed into having an abortion.
John Sweeny, education officer at the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children Scotland, said: "Such decisions have often been made in haste. For counselling and information to be comprehensive a woman needs time to think about the life-changing decision she may be making."
Health Minister Andy Kerr said the Executive will examine the health boards' performance on the time limit for abortions later this year.
He said: "Our sexual health strategy states that in order to limit possible emotional, physical and psychological effects for women this should be the maximum waiting time."
The full article contains 746 words and appears in Scotland On Sunday newspaper.
