OBJECTIVE: To systematically review the effectiveness of telehealth interventions for improving obstetric and gynecologic health outcomes. DATA SOURCES: We conducted a comprehensive search for primary literature in ClinicalTrials.gov, Cochrane Library, Cochrane Collaboration Registry of Controlled Trials, EMBASE, PubMed, and MEDLINE. METHODS OF STUDY SELECTION: Qualifying primary studies had a comparison group, were conducted in countries ranked very high on the United Nations Human Development Index, published in English, and evaluated obstetric and gynecologic health outcomes. Cochrane Collaboration's tool and ROBINS-I tool were used for assessing risk of bias. Summary of evidence tables were created using the United States Preventive Services Task Force Summary of Evidence Table for Evidence Reviews. TABULATION, INTEGRATION, RESULTS: Of the 3,926 published abstracts identified, 47 met criteria for inclusion and included 31,967 participants. Telehealth interventions overall improved obstetric outcomes related to smoking cessation and breastfeeding. Telehealth interventions decreased the need for high-risk obstetric monitoring office visits while maintaining maternal and fetal outcomes. One study found reductions in diagnosed preeclampsia among women with gestational hypertension. Telehealth interventions were effective for continuation of oral and injectable contraception; one text-based study found increased oral contraception rates at 6 months. Telehealth provision of medication abortion services had similar clinical outcomes compared with in-person care and improved access to early abortion. Few studies suggested utility for telehealth to improve notification of sexually transmitted infection test results and app-based intervention to improve urinary incontinence symptoms. CONCLUSION: Telehealth interventions were associated with improvements in obstetric outcomes, perinatal smoking cessation, breastfeeding, early access to medical abortion services, and schedule optimization for high-risk obstetrics. Further well-designed studies are needed to examine these interventions and others to generate evidence that can inform decisions about implementation of newer telehealth technologies into obstetrics and gynecology practice.

Bayesian networks are a powerful probabilistic representation, and their use for classification has received considerable attention. However, they tend to perform poorly when learned in the standard way. This is attributable to a mismatch between the objective function used (likelihood or a function thereof) and the goal of classification (maximizing accuracy or conditional likelihood). Unfortunately, the computational cost of optimizing structure and parameters for conditional likelihood is prohibitive. In this paper we show that a simple approximationchoosing structures by maximizing conditional likelihood while setting parameters by maximum likelihood-yields good results. On a large suite of benchmark datasets, this approach produces better class probability estimates than naive Bayes, TAN, and generatively-trained Bayesian networks.

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Objectives In 2013, Texas passed omnibus legislation restricting abortion services. Provisions restricting medical abortion, banning most procedures after 20 weeks and requiring physicians to have hospital admitting privileges were enforced in November 2013; by September 2014, abortion facilities must meet the requirements of ambulatory surgical centers (ASCs). We aimed to rapidly assess the change in abortion services after the first three provisions went into effect. Study Design We requested information from all licensed Texas abortion facilities on abortions performed between November 2012 and April 2014, including the abortion method and gestational age (<12 weeks versus ≥12 weeks). Results In May 2013, there were 41 facilities providing abortion in Texas; this decreased to 22 in November 2013. Both clinics closed in the Rio Grande Valley, and all but one closed in West Texas. Comparing November 2012–April 2013 to November 2013–April 2014, there was a 13% decrease in the abortion rate (from 12.9 to 11.2 abortions/1000 women age 15–44). Medical abortion decreased by 70%, from 28.1% of all abortions in the earlier period to 9.7% after November 2013 (p<0.001). Second-trimester abortion increased from 13.5% to 13.9% of all abortions (p<0.001). Only 22% of abortions were performed in the state’s six ASCs. Conclusions The closure of clinics and restrictions on medical abortion in Texas appear to be associated with a decline in the in-state abortion rate and a marked decrease in the number of medical abortions. Implications Supply-side restrictions on abortion—especially restrictions on medical abortion—can have a profound impact on access to services. Access to abortion care will become even further restricted in Texas when the ASC requirement goes into effect in 2014.

Clinic closures after House Bill 2 resulted in significant burdens for women able to obtain care.

OBJECTIVE: To conduct a retrospective observational cohort study to estimate the abortion complication rate, including those diagnosed or treated at emergency departments (EDs). METHODS:Using 2009-2010 abortion data among women covered by the fee-for-service California Medicaid program and all subsequent health care for 6 weeks after having an abortion, we analyzed reasons for ED visits and estimated the abortion-related complication rate and the adjusted relative risk. Complications were defined as receiving an abortion-related diagnosis or treatment at any source of care within 6 weeks after an abortion. Major complications were defined as requiring hospital admission, surgery, or blood transfusion. RESULTS:A total of 54,911 abortions among 50,273 feefor-service Medi-Cal beneficiaries were identified. Among all abortions, 1 of 16 (6.4%, n53,531) was followed by an ED visit within 6 weeks but only 1 of 115 (0.87%, n5478) resulted in an ED visit for an abortionrelated complication. Approximately 1 of 5,491 (0.03%, n515) involved ambulance transfers to EDs on the day of the abortion. The major complication rate was 0.23% (n5126, 1/436): 0.31% (n535) for medication abortion, 0.16% (n557) for first-trimester aspiration abortion, and 0.41% (n534) for second-trimester or later procedures. The total abortion-related complication rate including all sources of care including EDs and the original abortion facility was 2.1% (n51,156): 5.2% (n5588) for medication abortion, 1.3% (n5438) for first-trimester aspiration abortion, and 1.5% (n5130) for second-trimester or later procedures.CONCLUSION: Abortion complication rates are comparable to previously published rates even when ED visits are included and there is no loss to follow-up. 1 accurate estimates of abortion complications are paramount to assess and improve quality of care and determine how public policies can most effectively safeguard women's health. Although national abortion-related mortality data exist for the United States, 2 no surveillance system captures abortion-related morbidity. Studies find varying complication rates 3-7 depending on the procedure, weeks of gestation, length of follow-up, and protocols used to detect complications. Furthermore, complication rates are underestimated by low followup rates. 5,[7][8][9] Published complication rates are considered incomplete because they usually do not include those diagnosed at sites other than the original source of care. 10From the Advancing New Standards in Reproductive Health

Adverse events are rare with medical abortion, and telemedicine provision is noninferior to in-person provision with regard to clinically significant adverse events.