Tag Archives: contraception

December 2022 Healthy Intersections Podcast

By | December 8, 2022

In this month’s podcast, co-editor Jess Williams recaps blog posts from November and talks about some December journal articles. Listen here or wherever you get your podcasts. Transcription Welcome back to Healthy Intersections, the podcast of themedicalcareblog.com. In this month’s episode, I’ll review some of our blog entries from November and give you a preview… Read More »

Long-acting reversible contraception in the era of abortion bans

It is more important than ever to expand access to a broad range of safe and effective contraceptives that includes long-acting reversible contraception (LARC) methods. We are living in a new era in the US. As of early November, 2022, abortions are banned from the point of conception in 12 states and severely restricted in… Read More »

Racism in Reproductive Care and Beyond

By | October 29, 2020

As I scrolled through Ms. Jones’ chart, I jotted down her chronic problems: hypertension, depression, and urinary incontinence. She was taking lisinopril and sertraline. She had seen gynecology back in February for surgical management of the incontinence. The chart said she wanted a hysterectomy as “definitive management.”  It seemed the surgery was canceled due to… Read More »

Moving from Stigmatization to Healthy Sexuality: The Vital Role of Comprehensive Sex Ed

By | August 21, 2019

As a sexual health educator at public high schools in Tennessee, teachers would consistently jump in as I approached the topic of contraception. Required by law, these teachers would “emphatically promote sexual risk avoidance through abstinence.” After this abrupt interruption, I would then proceed to talk about all forms of contraception, including abstinence. Students would… Read More »

The Desire to Avoid Pregnancy Scale: A new way to measure pregnancy preferences

Why do we care about unintended pregnancies? Rates of unintended pregnancy “indicate the extent to which women and couples can determine freely whether and when they have children,” as stated by Finer and Zolna. There is some evidence that women and girls who have unintended pregnancies have a higher likelihood of other risk factors, such as… Read More »

The Link Between Prescription Copayments, Contraceptive Adherence, and Unintended Pregnancy in the United States

By | December 12, 2018

There are approximately 61 million women of reproductive age (15-44 years) in the United States, and at any given time, 70% of them are at risk of unintended pregnancy—that is, they are sexually active but do not want to become pregnant. About 72% of women who currently use contraception use non-permanent methods, such as the… Read More »

Opportunistic Salpingectomy: How is this Not Totally a Thing?

By | September 18, 2019

The name doesn’t exactly help. But before we discuss rebranding, a brief introduction to the concept . . . Salpingectomy refers to surgical removal of one (unilateral) or both (bilateral) fallopian tubes. It is thus a surgical option for female sterilization—but also drastically reduces a woman’s risk of ovarian cancer. This is huge. Ovarian cancer… Read More »

Promoting Primary Prevention of Neonatal Abstinence Syndrome

By | March 21, 2021

“Neonatal abstinence syndrome” (NAS) sounds deceptively innocuous, given that it is literally infant drug withdrawal. It is usually caused by prenatal exposure to opioids but can also result from maternal consumption of other substances, like alcohol and antianxiety medications. Common symptoms include excessive high-pitched crying, fever, sweating, irritability, vomiting, diarrhea, rapid breathing, sleep disturbances, and poor… Read More »

The Intersection of Religion, Female Empowerment, and Access to Reproductive Healthcare

By | June 20, 2017

Reproductive rights have been a topic for policy making and legal jurisprudence throughout much of the past century. As the healthcare system of the United States continues to evolve, women’s health and reproductive rights remain central to the debate. A recent policy update by Aishwarya Rajagopalan and Lisa Lines here at The Medical Care Blog discusses… Read More »

POLICY UPDATE: Contraception Coverage

The burden of contraception falls primarily on women. In the United States, women need prescriptions for the majority of contraceptive methods, and so are vulnerable to changes in the healthcare system affecting access to care. Recently, President Trump has issued executive orders on religious liberty and related subjects that have paved the way for a rule… Read More »

Should Women Rush to Get IUDs Post-Election? They Should’ve Been Rushing all Along!

The unintended pregnancy rate (reflecting pregnancies that are unwanted or mistimed) for women in the U.S. has hovered at around 50% for the last 35 years.  Only recently has that rate dropped to 45%, but the burden continues to fall most heavily on poor, undereducated women, women from racial or ethnic minority backgrounds, and young women.  Much talk… Read More »

Affordable Care Act reduced cost-sharing for long-acting reversible contraceptive methods

By | June 29, 2016

Since January 2013, most private insurance plans have been required to cover contraceptive services without patient cost-sharing. While health insurance plans have covered some methods of contraception with low cost-sharing, not all plans or methods have been covered equally. This is particularly the case of long-acting reversible contraceptive (LARC) methods, intrauterine devices (IUDs) and implants,… Read More »