To the Editor:

—The article by Page et al.,1 recently published in JGIM is an excellent example of clinic-based primary care research. Expansion of women’s access to family planning and abortion services is important to improve public health and quality of life, particularly in urban settings and marginalized patient populations.

The authors reference a dearth of internal medicine physicians currently providing medication abortions and a declining number of providers offering the services generally. The study shows that this shortage contrasts with the needs of patients, 84 % of whom felt it was very important for internal medicine physicians to offer abortion services. Even patients with personal objections to receiving an abortion felt medication abortion by an internist was an important option.

Those skeptical about internal medicine or primary care as the appropriate venue for termination of pregnancies should take note that nearly all patients in the study by Page et al. had seen a gynecologist or obstetrician within three years and still preferred internal medicine providers as an option. I commend the authors for expanding our knowledge of how to best serve our patients with unwanted pregnancies and for a rigorous and thought-provoking study.