access to telephone advice from a nurse or doctor and clear instructions on what to do if things don't go to plan. It's a protocol that works for the more than 17,000 women each year who request EMA from BPAS clinics alone. And the number is growing. In effect, managing an Early Medical Abortion at home is like managing a natural miscarriage -- except with EMA you know what's coming and can prepare for it. And, importantly, it isn't usually associated with the grief of the spontaneous end to a wanted pregnancy. Many women describe the cramping and bleeding as 'a relief' because it's confirmation that their pregnancy is over. When you're pregnant and you don't want to be, what you most want is your period. EMA isn't a period -- but it's probably the closest thing to it that there is. In other countries, such as the US, France and Sweden, women are given the misoprostol tablets -- ready to take at home when the time is right -- on their first visit. This means they are saved the unnecessary cost and inconvenience of a second clinic visit and, crucially, they are spared the anxiety of worrying that they will start to cramp and bleed on the way home. article continues after advertisement The misoprostol isn't dangerous. Indeed women who have suffered an incomplete early miscarriage are given the same medication to take at home in recognition of the fact that at such a sensitive time it is preferable