Easy access of hormonal contraceptives to women – age 20 to 24 years old.
Systematic review
|Updated
Key message
Background
This report assessed interventions to improve easy access of hormonal contraceptives to women – age 20 to 24 years old.
Objective
In order to clarify the objective we addressed these questions:
- Does prescription of hormonal contraception available at youth clinics, health services at universities and colleges and/or available from other health professions than medical doctors’ cause less abortions and unwanted pregnancies in young women?
- Does prescription on hormonal contraception available at youth clinics, health services at universities and colleges and/or available from other health professions than medical doctors’ bring increased sexually transmitted infections and/or thrombosis in young women?
- Does easy access of hormonal contraception lead to increased compliance?
- Does free or subsidized hormonal contraception bring less pregnancies, abortions and increased use of hormonal contraception?
- Does the combination of free or subsidized hormonal contraception and easy access of hormonal contraceptive cause less pregnancies and abortions in young women?
- Does easy access to emergency contraceptives (over the counter) for young women lead to decreased use of other hormonal contraception, fewer pregnancies and fewer abortions?
- Does advance provision of emergency contraception to young women bring less pregnancies and abortions?
The interventions described in the questions above were compared to usual access of hormonal contraception for young women (e.g. Prescription available from your GP and not subsidized or free).
Methods
We searched for relevant systematic reviews, randomised controlled trials and controlled trials in international databases, and appraised and synthesized studies which fulfilled our inclusion criteria.
Results
We summarized results from one Cochrane review only. The review had high methodological quality, but the quality of the documentation varied according to GRADE.
According to this review advanced provision of emergency contraception to young women did not decrease pregnancy rates nor did it have a negative impact on sexually and reproductive health behaviours more than control group (who only received information about emergency contraception).
Conclusion
We identified only one systematic review. This Cochrane review answered the last question that we addressed. We did not identify more relevant studies or reviews, in spite of a comprehensive search for literature in relevant databases. More controlled trials are needed to answer the questions addressed.