Part-time Doctor May Face Discipline Over 13-year-old's Abortion In Kansas

KANSAS CITY, MO — A part-time Planned Parenthood doctor accused of violating Kansas law by not preserving fetal tissue extracted during a 13-year-old girl's abortion and submitting it to the Kansas Bureau of Investigation may face disciplinary action.

The Kansas State Board of Healing Arts on Thursday was slated to discuss a petition accusing Dr. Allen Palmer of violating state law in his handling of the December 2014 abortion. The petition — by Susan Gering, the board's deputy litigation counsel — says Palmer was a contractor solely tasked with performing abortions for patients in their first trimester.

The petition says the girl was impregnated by her then-19-year-old boyfriend and sought a surgical abortion at Comprehensive Health of Planned Parenthood of Kansas and Mid-Missouri Inc. in December 2014, when the fetus was nearly 11 weeks old. (For more information on this and other neighborhood stories, subscribe to Patch to receive daily newsletters and breaking news alerts. If you have an iPhone, click here to get the free Patch iPhone app.)

Palmer, while filling in for a vacationing medical director, performed an in-clinic abortion but failed to preserve fetal tissue extracted and submit it to the Kansas Bureau of Investigation as required by state law, according to the petition. Kansas requires collection of fetal tissue for any abortion performed on a minor under the age of 14. The procedure was Palmer's first involving someone younger than 14.

Planned Parenthood argues that Palmer "found it unnecessary to familiarize himself in detail with (Kansas) laws requiring the preservation of fetal tissue extracted during an abortion procedure" on a minor.

On Jan. 16, 2015, Aaron Samulcek — then the chief operating officer of the regional Planned Parenthood affiliate — filed a complaint with the board against Palmer.

Palmer has been licensed in Kansas since 2008 to practice osteopathic medicine and surgery and had it renewed in October of last year, according to the petition, which presses for Palmer's license to be revoked, suspended, placed on probation, censured or otherwise limited.

It was not immediately clear Thursday if Palmer still provides services to Planned Parenthood, which did not immediately respond to messages seeking comment.

A man who answered the telephone at a suburban St. Louis listing for Palmer hung up Thursday on an Associated Press reporter. The petition says Palmer's attorney insisted his client inadvertently violated the state law and regulations because he wasn't aware of them and had not received training on the relevant Planned Parenthood policies and procedures involving the treatment of minors.

By JIM SUHR, Associated Press

Photo credit: John Hanna/Associated Press