Clinics Wrestle With Gag Order on Abortion : Counseling: Centers have 60 to 90 days in which to comply with strict new rule. One group will ‘fight tooth and nail.’

Terry Medina pressed her hands to her temples, as though her head hurt. She was trying to remember how her family-planning counselors would have to respond to patients seeking abortions if the clinic decides to abide by a controversial Supreme Court ruling that essentially throws a gag order on them.

“I don’t even want to think about it,” said Medina, manager of the Planned Parenthood Eastside clinic, as a pained look crossed her face. “We’d have to tell them, ‘Abortion is not an appropriate form of family planning.’ ”

That is all the counselors would be allowed to say under the rules upheld by the court.

On Friday, the day after the high court ruled that federally subsidized clinics cannot advise a pregnant woman that abortion is an option, the mood at the Planned Parenthood Family Planning Center in East Los Angeles was defiant, confused, angry and sad.

One client, who had received an abortion there four years ago--and who returned, pregnant again, for prenatal care--reacted indignantly to the news.

“Where are poor women going to get information from?” asked the client, Susan Noble, 22. “If someone can’t afford to bring a child into the world, why should they have to?”

Clinics that receive federal assistance have 60 to 90 days in which to comply with the strict new rule, which had been blocked by court challenges since the last year of the Ronald Reagan Administration.

Stephanie D. Alexander, director of clinical programs for Planned Parenthood Los Angeles, said the organization, which operates nine clinics in Los Angeles County, will spend the next few months “fighting tooth and nail” against the regulations.

Until then, officials at Planned Parenthood and other family planning centers around Los Angeles said they do not plan to change their practices

“We are not going to curtail the freedom of speech of our counselors and clinicians,” said Planned Parenthood Executive Director Dr. Joan Babbott.

But, as workers on the front lines of the abortion battle, staffers at the Planned Parenthood Eastside clinic said the ruling has hit them hard.

“It’s a real down mood in here today,” said Medina, who runs the facility across the street from County-USC Medical Center. “It’s just confusing. There’s so much education you need to give people. There are people asking you for help and information we’re not supposed to provide them.

“We’re not pushing abortion. But it is a choice that (women) have.”

Georgina Kovacs, a physician’s assistant who has worked at the clinic for nearly 10 years, said she woke up to the news of the court decision when she turned on the radio Thursday morning.

“It was a shock to me. . . . Does it mean you can’t say to a woman who is bleeding, ‘You’re having a miscarriage, go to the emergency room?’ That would be risking a patient’s life,” she said.

“It’s not like if you don’t talk about (abortion), it’s going to go away.”

Most of the patients who came to the Eastside clinic Friday were unaware of the ruling and weren’t sure what to make of it. But those who had an opinion were adamant that it was wrong.

“It’s so stupid,” said Dee Shuck, 34, who had brought her 16-year-old daughter, LaKeasha Lewis, in for a gynecological examination. “So many girls are getting pregnant--they’re babies having babies. They should have that right--to know the options. Especially because so many parents don’t talk to their children.”

Several of the women who had heard about the ruling raised many questions, said counselor Gracie Cruz. These included: Do I have to go somewhere else for an abortion? Will it cost more money there? Will my parents have to be told?

At first, Cruz said, she was unsure how to respond. But she knew that the ruling clashed with the realities of their lives.

“They say, ‘My husband beats me up.’ ‘I already have a 4-month-old (child).’ ‘I use drugs.’ ‘I’m out of work.’ Or: ‘My mom kicked me out of the house.’ So, I tell them the options,” Cruz said. These include continuing the pregnancy and keeping the baby, giving the infant up for adoption and abortion.

“I can’t tell them, ‘No, you can’t have an abortion.’ . . . If we couldn’t give them the information, I feel patients would feel we were letting them down.”

Planned Parenthood is trying to determine how the organization could continue receiving the federal subsidy without cutting the level of service to its mostly low-income clients, executive director Babbott said. The options include reorganizing the clinics into separate corporations to keep the federal money separate from other funding.

But many centers will face wrenching decisions if the rule is allowed to stand, said Gary Bess of the Los Angeles Free Clinic.

“The dilemma is that turning down the federal money means we’re going to serve less people, and we’re already turning people away,” Bess said. “But to accept it would be to compromise the quality of care we provide. We believe that poor people should have the same availability of care.”

Times staff writer Laurie Becklund contributed to this article.