Therapeutic Abortion and the Psychiatrist
Z. ALEXANDER AARONS M.D.1
1 Psychiatric Clinic of the Mt. Zion Hospital, San Francisco, Calif.
The psychiatrist encounters many difficulties when requested to recommend a therapeutic abortion. To evaluate a pregnant woman's emotional fitness for motherhood, the psychiatrist must determine the nature of her neurotic conflicts, her ability to form object relationships, and her appreciation for reality conditions. State laws on therapeutic abortion disregard these criteria. To what extent a pregnancy or its termination has any crucial effect in altering a woman's basic emotional condition or in affecting a chronic emotional illness is questioned.
