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Dr. Nada Stotland's
Problem with Denial
Part Two of Three By Wanda Franz, Ph.D., NRLC President Editor's note. A pro-lifer recently made me aware of a five-minute YouTube presentation by Dr. Nada Stotland [www.youtube.com/watch?v=1IbeAJzveGo]. There is nothing subtle either about the caption over the video or her presentation: "Abortion Trauma Syndrome Does Not Exist." This is simply not true, so I turned to NRLC President Dr. Wanda Franz to critique the video. Dr. Franz, a developmental psychologist and professor emerita of child development at West Virginia University, has studied the issue of post-abortion trauma for decades. I will add a couple of comments at the end.
Dr. Stotland is an influential psychiatrist, the former President of the American Psychiatric Association. She is a powerful advocate of abortion and has used her professional training and position to further her abortion advocacy. In this You Tube video, she presents herself as a scientist opposed to pro-life positions on scientific grounds. In reality, she provides unreasonable and unsubstantiated personal attacks on pro-lifers, while denying the presence of good scientific evidence (which does exist), because it doesn't support her pro-abortion bias. She attacks pro-life advocates for using the term "Post Abortion Syndrome," pointing out that this syndrome does not appear in the Diagnostic Manuals used to identify psychiatric disorders. Of course, the content of these manuals is controlled by pro-abortion advocates like her. However, what she doesn't say is that many qualified professionals have recognized the symptoms suffered by some women after abortion as falling under the diagnosis of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). PTSD does appear in the Diagnostic Manuals and the pattern of suffering that is observed by psychiatrists in these women provides a perfectly legitimate diagnosis of PTSD. Because there is a recognizable pattern of symptoms, there is nothing wrong, misleading, or inaccurate in clinicians referring to it as Post Abortion Syndrome. Stotland completely denies the presence of a number of research studies that have looked at women following their abortions. Some of these studies have used the official scientific tests used for identifying individuals suffering with PTSD. When individuals meet certain standards established by these tests, they are officially diagnosed with the psychiatric problem, as specified by the Diagnostic Manual. In these studies, the majority of the women show some symptoms of PTSD, but around 20% of the women can be diagnosed with severe psychiatric problems. More than 20 years ago, we began to see some of the signs of abortion trauma in women coming into the pro-life movement. We began to invite clinicians to our conventions to help us understand the phenomenon that they were seeing in their practices. I received a call from a psychiatrist working in a Veterans Affairs Hospital. He said, "I think I know why you are seeing problems in your women who have had abortions. They have PTSD. I'm working with it all the time in the VA Hospital." He went on to suggest to me that I shouldn't be too surprised if no one wanted to acknowledge the presence of PTSD in these women: he said no one wanted to acknowledge it in veterans either. It took years to get people to begin to accept its reality. Scientists continue to disagree about the severity and significance of these findings, but Stotland denies the presence of any scientific debate among the specialists. She also denies the presence of a methodologically strong study examining tens of thousands of women whose abortions or deliveries were paid for by the Medi-Cal program in California. Subsequently, some of the women applied for payment for psychiatric care and received clinical diagnoses for which they were treated. The women who had aborted their pregnancies were significantly more likely to be treated by California psychiatrists for depressive psychosis and bipolar disorder. Stotland argues that the term "depression" is mis-used in non-scientific circles when people use it generally to mean that women are unhappy about their abortions. She acknowledges that there can be bad feelings about abortion, but denies that these feelings rise to the level of a psychiatric disorder. While it is certainly true that the average person uses the term "depression" in this general way, that does not change the fact that many excellent scientific papers, using psychiatric assessments and diagnoses, support the presence of psychiatrically-diagnosed severe levels of depression in women following abortion. Of course, Stotland denies the value of these papers, claiming they have severe methodological problems. However, recent meta-analyses do not support her claim. (A meta-analysis is a study which pools the results of several studies in order to achieve greater statistical accuracy.) When the best studies are compared, the evidence is strong that abortion has negative effects on women. In general, Stotland appears to be in denial about a lot of things related to abortion. I wonder if this rises to the level of a psychiatric problem. Dr. Franz has wonderfully addressed the major weaknesses in Dr. Stotland's presentation which, ironically, is supposed to be revealing the alleged weaknesses in the case that post abortion syndrome exists. As you watch the video Dr. Stotland is responding to "Frequently asked questions about Abortion Trauma Syndrome" that flash up on the screen. This is to give the impression that she is matter-of-factly responding as an objective, above-the-fray scientist. (To add to this later there is a bogus question, "Should the debate focus more on science and less on morality?") Yet at one and the same time she professes to respect (even to "resonate with") those who have "religious and moral objections" to abortion, she accuses those who have carefully studied the issue of using "immoral means which is lying to people and knowing darn well you are lying to people." So not only does she snootily dismiss the work of serious academicians (there is a "large literature, if you can call it that…"), Dr. Stotland flat out accuses those who differ with her of lying and using a "deliberate strategy of fear." One other thing. According to Dr. Stotland, "All bona fide scientists have agreed that this literature just doesn't cut it." Really? No one who finds clear evidence of post abortion syndrome qualifies as a "bona fide scientist"? Even by pro-abortion standards, this is arrogance on steroids. Please send all of your comments to daveandrusko@gmail.com. If you like, join those who are now following me on Twitter at http://twitter.com/daveha. |
