Background: Women of non-Western origin are over-represented among women requesting induced abortion before the end of the 12th week of pregnancy, in Oslo, Norway. Our aim was to find out if that was also the case for women requesting induced abortion after week 12.
Material and methods: We assessed differences between Western and non-Western women in duration of pregnancy at request for induced abortion and the proportion accepted for abortion. All women requesting induced abortion after the 12th week of pregnancy at Ullevål University Hospital, Oslo from January 2000 to September 2003 (n = 378) were included. Information about the number of fertile women in Oslo according to ethnic background was found in the municipality of Oslo's statistical office. Other data were obtained from patient medical records.
Results: 23% (87/378) of all women requesting late induced abortion and 15.5% (20,636/132,843) of women aged 15-50 years in Oslo had non-Western background (p < 0.05). The mean gestational age at the time of requested abortion among non-Western women was 16.4 weeks and among Western women it was 15.6 weeks (p = 0.01). There was a non-significant increased risk of having the abortion request rejected for non-Western as compared to Western women (adjusted odds ratio 1.6; 95% CI 0.5-5.5), after control for gestational age and maternal age.
Interpretation: It is known that non-Western women in Oslo are over-represented among women giving birth and women requesting induced abortion in general. This study shows that non-western women are also over-represented among women requesting induced abortion after the 12th pregnancy week.