Abstract
Background
The potential that ongoing contraception and emergency contraception (EC) offer to
reduce unplanned pregnancy and abortion is diminished by many barriers. Even when
women seek care, their acute needs for those interventions may not be assessed.
Study Design
This is a retrospective chart review of charts of women potentially at risk for unplanned
pregnancy who were provided care in an OB-GYN urgent care clinic in a tertiary care,
training hospital. Information was collected about the patient's age group, her presenting
complaint, the specialty of the resident who saw her and whether or not her needs
for EC and ongoing contraception were assessed and/or met.
Results
Charts of 1006 visits were assessed; the visits of 666 potentially at-risk women were
included. Slightly more than one third (37.5%) of women were asked about contraception.
Only 11% of women were asked about recent unprotected intercourse; 20% of women with
recent unprotected intercourse were given EC.
Conclusions
Even in centers dedicated to women's reproductive health, the acute need for fertility
control and EC is not adequately assessed. Many opportunities to reduce unintended
pregnancy are missed.
Keywords
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Article info
Publication history
Published online: October 30, 2006
Accepted:
September 5,
2006
Received in revised form:
September 1,
2006
Received:
August 17,
2006
Footnotes
���There was no outside funding for this study. All work was donated and done by the investigators.
Identification
Copyright
© 2007 Elsevier Inc. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
