Abortion/Pregnancy Data Contact, Citation and Description

Updated 9/26/06

Contact: Joyce Grant-Worley, Oregon Department of Human Services, Office of Disease Prevention &
Epidemiology, Center for Health Statistics, joyce.a.grant-worley@state.or.us

Citation: Abortion Report Records: Oregon Department of Human Services, Center for Health
Statistics.

Description: Data for the Abortion/Pregnancy Assessment Topic are derived from abortion records and
birth certificates. Pregnancies are calculated by adding births and abortions. Fetal deaths are not
included. See Fertility Data Description for more information.

Abortion data in VistaPHw are reported by county of residence – not occurrance. While abortions
obtained out-of-state by Oregon residents are included, some states (e.g., California) do not record data
on residence for abortion patients. Therefore, the number of abortions to Oregon residents that are
performed outside of Oregon cannot be estimated.

For that reason, all abortions that occur in Oregon are counted regardless of the woman’s state of
residence. County-level analyses include only abortions to residents of that county that occurred
somewhere in Oregon.

Abortion and pregnancy rates measure the frequency of abortions and pregnancies among women of
child bearing age in the population and among women in specific age ranges. Rates also measure the
frequency of abortions occurring within gestational age ranges such as trimesters of pregnancy or any
user-specified range in weeks. The clinical estimate of gestational age is used when it is available,
otherwise it is calculated as the date of termination minus the date of last menses. In Oregon,
calculated gestational ages that fall outside the range of 2 to 27 weeks are recoded as missing values.

Rates can also be examined by specific age groups of pregnant women. While race is reportable on
abortion certificates, the large amount of missing data precludes computing accurate race-specific
rates.

Several different kinds of rates can be calculated:

Abortion Rate - The number of induced abortions among women of all ages per 1,000 women of
childbearing age (i.e. age 15-44 years).

Pregnancy Rate - The number of births plus induced abortions among women of all ages per 1,000
women of childbearing age (i.e. age 15-44 years). Fetal deaths are not included.

Abortion Percent - The number of induced abortions per 100 pregnancies (not including pregnancies
ending in fetal death).

Percent Abortions by Gestational Age - The percent of all abortions occurring within gestational age
groups.