Healthy People Consortium Meeting and Public Hearing
"Building the Next Generation of Healthy People"
November 12 and 13, 1998
Capital Hilton, Washington, D.C.

Family Planning

1. Background Issues

Lack of mention of certified nurse-midwives as family planning providers. The American College of Nurse-midwives has some additional research on contraceptive issues that might be useful in bolstering the introductory section of the family planning chapter.

2. Data Issues

In order to provide more in-depth looks at specific trends within population groups, racial/ethnic breakouts should provide more detail by age groupings, especially for objectives #1 and 3. It was pointed out that adolescent Hispanics have the highest rates of sexual activity and pregnancy and marry younger than their counterparts.It would be helpful to look at rural/urban or other geographic distributions where possible. An observation was made about the lack of information on adolescents under the age of 15, and a suggestion made that perhaps the YRBSS could be used as a measure for this age group.

Concern was expressed about the need for collecting data on use of emergency contraception, as well as data on correct utilization of emergency contraception (although this was acknowledged as being difficult to do).

3. Draft Objectives

The chapter does not include any measure of abortion. The document should include a measure that monitors abortion use among women. Targeted prevention efforts would seek to reduce the number of unintended pregnancies that result in abortion.

Participants:

Evelyn Kappeler
Family Planning Work Group Coordinator
Office of Population Affairs, OSOPHS, DHHS

Ana Rivas-Beck
Senior Policy Analyst
National Coalition of Hispanic Health and Human Services Organizations

Mychelle Farmer
Assistant Professor
Johns Hopkins University and Society for Adolescent Medicine

Kimberly Cowins
American College of Nurse-Midwives

Dorothy Koslowski
Director
Willets Health Center, Rutgers University
National Alliance of Nurse Practitioners