U.K. woman wins right to receive permanent birth control after exposing double standards in health service

A British woman spent years trying to obtain sterilization on the NHS while her local health provider funds vasectomies for men. (The Good Brigade/Digital Vision/Getty Images via CNN Newsource)

LONDON - A British woman who was denied permanent birth control through the U.K.’s national health service on the grounds she might regret the decision has won her case with the country’s health ombudsman after a 10-year battle.

Leah Spasova, a psychologist from Oxfordshire, spent years trying to obtain sterilization on the NHS when at the same time her health provider funds vasectomies for men.

The Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman (PHSO), which investigates complaints about the NHS, determined that a local health body was denying women, but not men, funding for sterilization.

Spasova raised the complaint after she was denied a request for sterilization funding from the Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire West Integrated Care Board (ICB), which covers an area of southern England.

“I have been enquiring about sterilization for 10 years and was just passed back and forth between services,” Spasova said.

“Then the ICB turned down my request for funding.”

Conducting her own research into the ICB’s approach, she found the organization “did not follow the widely recognized principle that clinicians provide advice, but patients ultimately make decisions about their own bodies.”

The ombudsman determined that the ICB did not routinely fund female sterilization and cited cost concerns and Spasova’s risk of regretting the procedure as reasons for refusing her – factors not applied to men seeking vasectomies

“Rejecting my application for sterilization on the basis of regret means they were taking on liability for my feelings,” Spasova said.

The ICB’s approach was unfair, inconsistent, and based on subjective reasoning, the PHSO found.

It also found that women were not given the same opportunity as men to make an informed decision about sterilization.

Paula Sussex, the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman, said there were concerns that the health service was letting patients down.

“This case shows the power of the patient voice. Leah complained about her experience and the ICB is now reviewing its sterilization policy,” she said.

Spasova described the ICB’s policies as “absolutely discriminatory.”

“There is continuing widespread inequality in how permanent contraception is accessed with concerns about fairness and respect for women’s bodily autonomy remain unresolved.”

The NHS authority which now oversees health services for those who live in Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire, said that it accepts the PHSO’s findings and has introduced a new policy to ensure that patients who meet the criteria are able to access female sterilization.

Female sterilization involves blocking a woman’s fallopian tubes and is over 99 per cent effective. It is comparable to a vasectomy, a permanent method of male contraception, but female sterilization requires more invasive surgery and is less easy to reverse.

By Sophie Tanno, CNN