FILE - OB-GYN Dr. Kylie Cooper eats dinner with her husband, Nick, and daughters, Hazel, second left, and Cleo, Thursday, June 15, 2023, in Minnesota. Her family loved Idaho. She and her husband lived in a great neighborhood and had a group of friends. The kids did well in school. “We just had a good life,” Cooper said. “We had no plans to leave.” That changed after Idaho banned abortion.
Abbie Parr / AP
A new peer-reviewed study shows Idaho lost a net 35% of its obstetrician-gynecologist physicians between the implementation of Idaho’s numerous strict abortion bans in 2022 and December of 2024.
While Idaho recruited 20 obstetric physicians in that time frame, another 114 of 268 physicians stopped practicing obstetrics, left the state, closed their practices within the state, or retired.
The study was conducted by Idaho-based researchers and led by Dr. Edward McEachern.
“This statewide study is unique in that we were able to directly confirm granular practice changes with the physicians themselves, rather than relying solely on large credentialing and administrative datasets,” McEachern said in a statement provided by the Idaho Medical Association.
Some providers and medical organizations including the IMA have said that the state’s abortion laws criminalize what can be a medically necessary procedure, causing doctors to leave the state and making recruitment of new providers harder.
The findings build on the previous year’s “Post-Roe Idaho Report,” published by the Idaho Physician Well-Being Action Collaborative, in partnership with the Idaho Coalition for Safe Healthcare.
“Idaho is digging a physician workforce hole that will take years, if not decades, to fill,” said Susie Keller, CEO of the Idaho Medical Association.
Dr. Megan Kasper, an OB-GYN in Nampa and president-elect of IMA, said the changes are hitting rural communities the hardest.
“We have fantastic doctors and healthcare teams caring for women in Idaho, but we are at the point where strain on the maternal workforce is impacting patients, especially in our rural communities,” she said.
The study also showed that 85% of OB-GYNs in Idaho practice in the seven most populated counties.
“In the remaining 37 counties, by the study’s conclusion, 23 OB/GYN practicing obstetricians served a population of 569,000 Idahoans,” according to the study.
Rachel Sun name is a reporter with Northwest Public Broadcasting. This story comes to you from the Northwest News Network, a collaboration between public media organizations in Oregon and Washington.
It is part of OPB’s broader effort to ensure that everyone in our region has access to quality journalism that informs, entertains and enriches their lives. To learn more, visit our journalism partnerships page.
