Perspectives on Sexual and Reproductive Health articles from November 2003

Perspectives on Sexual and Reproductive Health archives from November 2003

Choosing does not mean using.(FYI)(Brief Article)
November 1, 2003... The majority of women who opted for a female-controlled over-the-counter barrier method after attending an educational session on sexual risk reduction at one of three clinics in the San Francisco Bay Area did not use the method during the next...

Screening opportunities missed.(FYI)(Brief Article)
November 1, 2003... Individuals who are infected with gonorrhea or chlamydia are at high risk for acquiring HIV or syphilis and thus would benefit from being tested for these diseases; for those on Medicaid, however, such testing is rare. (1) In an examination of...

Dual use grows among teenagers.(FYI)(Brief Article)
November 1, 2003... Seven percent of sexually active U.S. teenagers surveyed in 2001 said they had used both a condom and a hormonal contraceptive at last sex, a significantly higher proportion than the 3% who reported using dual methods in 1991. (1) Analyses of...

Wine, women and pregnancy.(FYI)(Brief Article)
November 1, 2003... Wine drinkers who are trying to become pregnant may conceive in a shorter time than women who do not drink wine, according to a study of nearly 30,000 planned births in Denmark in 1997-2000. (1) In an analysis controlling for a number of...

You think you know a person.(FYI)(Brief Article)
November 1, 2003... When people with sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) are asked their partner's age, race or ethnicity, or the duration of their relationship, they usually give the same answer as their partner; not so for other key indicators of sexual health...

Young women gain on cancer.(FYI)(Brief Article)
November 1, 2003... Between 1973 and 1999, the annual incidence of invasive cervical cancer among U.S. women younger than 30 declined from nearly two to 1.3 per 100,000 women; analysts studying surveillance data from the National Cancer Institute estimate that the...

Inching toward a male method.(FYI)(Brief Article)
November 1, 2003... A male contraceptive method involving testosterone implants and progestin injections produced very promising results in a preliminary study, and the findings pave the way for more extensive trials of this approach. (1) The 55 study...

History repeats itself.(FYI)(Brief Article)
November 1, 2003... Adolescent women who are physically assaulted by a romantic partner are at increased risk of having a similar experience during their first year of college; furthermore, throughout the college years, the risk of experiencing dating violence is...

America's Children.(Brief Article)
November 1, 2003... * America's Children: Key National Indicators of Well-Being, 2003 presents a detailed picture of the context in which children live, including population and family characteristics and indicators of children's economic security, health,...

Regardless of whether they are sexually experienced, the overwhelming majority of U.S. 15-17-year-olds think that it is "a good thing" to postpone sexual involvement until after high school, according to results of a nationally representative survey conducted by the Kaiser Family Foundation and seventeen magazine.(Brief Article)
November 1, 2003... * Regardless of whether they are sexually experienced, the overwhelming majority of U.S. 15-17-year-olds think that it is "a good thing" to postpone sexual involvement until after high school, according to results of a nationally representative...

Patterns of contraceptive use within teenagers' first sexual relationships.
November 1, 2003... CONTEXT: Teenagers have a high unintended pregnancy rate, in part because of inconsistent use or nonuse of contraceptives. It is important to determine how partner and relationship characteristics are related to contraceptive use and...

Partner influence on early discontinuation of the Pill in a predominantly hispanic population.
November 1, 2003... CONTEXT: Although studies have examined U.S. pill users' patterns of discontinuation, little is known about pill discontinuation, and the effects of partner influence, among Hispanics. METHODS: Follow-up data on pill use were collected from...

Factors associated with the content of sex education in U.S. public secondary schools.
November 1, 2003... CONTEXT: While sex education is almost universal in U.S. schools, its content varies considerably. Topics such as abstinence, and basic information on HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), are commonly taught; birth control and...

A new look at an old method: the diaphragm.(Viewpoint)
November 1, 2003... "For decades before we had oral contraceptives, untold and unstudied millions of women used the vaginal diaphragm lubricated with spermicide as a contraceptive. They experienced no major 'new' epidemics of sexually transmitted diseases or...

About half of U.S. adults have had an HIV test, but testing often occurs late in the course of infection.(Digest)
November 1, 2003... Nearly half of Americans aged 18 or older have ever been tested for HIV, and nearly two-thirds of those were tested voluntarily, primarily to learn their infection status, according to a 2001 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)...

Early prenatal care may not ensure improved outcomes among poor, rural infants.(Digest)
November 1, 2003... Being white, 20-34 years of age or a high school graduate was associated with receiving early prenatal care (in the first trimester of pregnancy) in a study of all Medicaid recipients giving birth in rural Williamsburg County, South Carolina,...

For low-risk women, care from a nurse-midwife is a safe option in pregnancy.(Digest)
November 1, 2003... For women with a low risk of perinatal complications, care involving collaboration between a certified nurse-midwife and a physician, and the option of delivering at a birth center, is as safe as traditional physician-based care and entails the...

Despite profile suggesting low risk, Indian-born U.S. mothers have high levels of some poor birth outcomes.(Digest)
November 1, 2003... Compared with white mothers born in the United States, Asian Indian mothers who have immigrated to the country have a lower prevalence of several social and demographic risk factors for poor birth outcomes; nevertheless, according to a...

Treating common vaginal infections may lower women's herpes risk.(Digest)
November 1, 2003... Women have roughly doubled odds of having herpes simplex virus type 2 (HSV-2) infection if they have abnormal vaginal flora or if they have ever had an uncircumcised sex partner, and their odds are increased by half if group B Streptococcus is...

Clinician support may play a role in mothers' decision to continue breast-feeding.(Digest)
November 1, 2003... A range of modifiable factors, including clinician support, may encourage mothers to continue breast-feeding their infants. A study in a Northern California health maintenance organization found that women whose health care providers had...

Religious teenagers may have a lowered risk of engaging in unsafe sexual behavior.(Digest)
November 1, 2003... Black teenage women who frequently participate in religious or spiritual activities are more likely than those who do not to engage in behaviors and hold attitudes that lower their risk of acquiring HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases...

Emergency contraception use increases when pills are provided in advance.(Digest)
November 1, 2003... Women who receive an advance supply of emergency contraceptives have four times the likelihood of those who do not of using the method within one year, according to a study of women from an inner-city public hospital. (1) Advance provision of...