What is the difference between curettage and abortion?

In life, we are quite familiar with abortion, but curettage and curettage does not sound so familiar. In fact, on the surface, abortion and curettage are both a form of miscarriage, but the techniques and principles they use are not quite the same. So what is the difference?

1. Curettage

A procedure to scrape the lining of the uterus or the contents of the uterus. This is a minor surgery commonly performed in obstetrics and gynecology and is one of the methods of artificial abortion. It is divided into two categories: diagnostic curettage (abbreviated as DCT) and therapeutic curettage.

(1) Diagnostic curettage is divided into general diagnostic curettage and segmented diagnostic curettage.

General diagnostic curettage is suitable for endocrine abnormalities, which require understanding of endometrial changes and responses to sex hormones, the presence or absence of ovulation, the presence or absence of tuberculosis, etc. Segmented diagnostic curettage refers to the operation of first scraping the cervical canal and then the uterine cavity. The scrapings are sent for pathological examination separately. It is suitable for diagnosing cervical cancer, endometrial cancer and other uterine malignancies, and can understand the range of the cancer.

(2) Therapeutic curettage can be divided into suction curettage and forceps curettage.

Suction curettage is the use of a negative pressure suction tube to suck out the contents of the uterine cavity, while forceps curettage is the use of an oval forceps to remove the contents of the uterine cavity, followed by curettage. The indications for therapeutic curettage include: those who want to terminate the pregnancy in early pregnancy, suction curettage within 3 months of pregnancy, forceps curettage to remove residual materials in the uterine cavity after 3 months and after induced abortion; those who need to empty the uterine cavity for incomplete abortion, inevitable abortion, missed abortion, retained placenta, hydatidiform mole, etc.

2. Abortion

Artificial abortion is also called flow. It refers to the termination of pregnancy by surgical means, also known as "artificial" termination of pregnancy. Surgical methods include vacuum aspiration and curettage. Vacuum aspiration is to use a hollow straw to enter the uterine cavity and use negative pressure to suck out the embryonic tissue in the uterus, while curettage is to use oval forceps to clamp out large pieces of embryonic tissue in the uterus. Abortion can be performed before 14 weeks of pregnancy.