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Birth
Control Options
U-M Radio
News Service, September 2003, Birth Control Options
2:28
http://www.med.umich.edu/opm/newspage/2003/birthcontrol.htm
Contraception Choices:
U-M women’s health expert offers guidance on choosing from
today’s array of options
(Download audio version) Suggested
Lead: New innovations in contraception, from hormone-based
medications to internal devices, are giving women more birth control
alternatives that fit better in today’s lifestyles — providing
women with nearly effortless methods and safer choices. But how
do you decide what is right for you? Here is Erin Block with more
TRT 2:28
SOQ
Some women may prefer to use natural methods of
pregnancy prevention for religious or cultural reasons. But for
those who choose drugs
or devices, the options can be dizzying — ranging from hormone-based
medications, such as oral contraceptives, implants, injections,
and patches to contraceptive devices, such as the male and female
condom, the IUD, the diaphragm and the cervical cap.
Dr. Vanessa Dalton, (M.D., M.P.H.), from the department of Obstetrics
and Gynecology at the University of Michigan Health System suggests
“When women are choosing or trying to select among many
different kinds of birth control, there’s a few things that
they need to consider. One of them is do they have any medical
problems that would make some forms of birth control not a good
option for them. The other thing they need to consider is what
kind of user they would be. In other words, are they somebody that
can remember to take a pill every day? Or do they have a schedule
that makes it very improbable that they’ll be able to take
a pill on a regular basis? Do they feel comfortable interrupting
sexual activity to use, for example, a diaphragm or a condom?”
New innovations in hormonal birth control, which stop the ovaries
from releasing an egg each month, provide many options with a high
rate of success.
Dalton explains
“In hormonal contraceptives there’s actually quite
a few new advancements. If you consider what we used to use for
birth control pills even ten years ago, the dosage just keeps getting
lower and lower and lower. And what that means for women is that
the side-effect profile is quite a bit different. So a lot of women
will come to me that are maybe in their late 30’s that had
tried to use birth control pills many years ago when they were
a teenager and they are reluctant to do that again because it had
a lot of side-effects, when in reality the dosages are a lot different
these days so the side effect profiles are better.”
For women who choose not to take hormones they
also have the options of condoms or IUD’s.
And there are new contraceptive alternatives that are currently
being studied.
Dalton tells us
“The contraceptive options for men, actually there are some
options that are available, some hormonal options that people have
been investigating for a number of years. They’re not on
the market at this point. They probably will be quite effective.
It will be a major shift from what our cultural norms are to have
men responsible for taking a pill everyday for contraception. I’ll
be a very interesting to see how well that’s received.”
I’m Erin Block for U-M Health System News
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