(NewsNation) — Abortion providers in South Carolina have petitioned the state’s Supreme Court to clarify part of an abortion ban the justices upheld earlier this week, asking them to decide when exactly during a pregnancy the ban should begin.

Plaintiffs’ lawyers filed the request based on the ambiguity of the definition of “fetal heartbeat” raised by the Supreme Court at both oral argument and in Wednesday’s decision, Planned Parenthood South Atlantic said.

Justice John Kittredge, in the majority opinion, wrote the court was “leav(ing) for another day” a decision on when, exactly, the “fetal heartbeat” limit begins during pregnancy.

The measure passed by the Republican-dominated General Assembly bans abortion after what it calls a “fetal heartbeat” is identified. The law defines that term as “cardiac activity, or the steady and repetitive rhythmic contraction of the fetal heart, within the gestational sac.” Medical professionals can usually detect cardiac activity around six weeks of pregnancy, which is before most people know they are pregnant.

That language is clinically inaccurate according to medical consensus, which holds that such “cardiac activity” is not a heartbeat and an embryo has not yet become a fetus at that stage. A 2013 University of Leeds study determined that the four clearly defined chambers in the heart that appear from the eighth week of pregnancy remain “a disorganized jumble of tissue” until around the 20th week.

Planned Parenthood South Atlantic argues in its filing that if the high court determines the term “fetal heartbeat” is ambiguous, it should construe the definition to be when the chambers of the heart have been formed.

“(The) decision to uphold South Carolina’s abortion ban has already resulted in even more chaos in the health care system. South Carolinians are being denied the health care they need. We need clarity from the court now,” Planned Parenthood South Atlantic and the Greenville Women’s Clinic said in a statement.

The court’s ruling was opposite one months earlier striking down a similar ban passed in 2021.

Chief Justice Donald Beatty provided the lone dissent in Wednesday’s 4-1 decision, arguing that the 2023 law is nearly identical, with definitions for terms including “fetal heartbeat” and “conception” that provide no clarity on when the ban begins, exposing doctors to criminal charges if law enforcement disagrees with their expertise.

South Carolina’s law requires that providers perform an ultrasound on any patient seeking an abortion, display the images and record a description of any present “fetal heartbeat.” But the justices left legally undecided the question of whether “cardiac activity” and the described “rhythmic contraction of the fetal heart” refer to the same point or two separate points in a pregnancy.

Beatty warned that the majority’s failure to address such a key question could lead to political retribution. He added that judicial independence and integrity were weakened by the court’s decision to backpedal on its prior ruling.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.