Emergency contraception awareness rose from 1996 to 2002.(Survey Of Teenage Girls)

PHILADELPHIA -- Teenage girls knew more about emergency contraception in 2002 than in 1996, but they still have a way to go, according to surveys done with about 100 girls each year at one medical center.

Since 1996, adolescent girls have "increased their awareness, use, and positive attitude toward emergency contraception [EC] and decreased their perceived barriers to using EC," Allison M. Aiken said at the annual meeting of the North American Society for Pediatric and Adolescent Gynecology. Despite these steps, it remains critical to continue to educate girls about EC. Even in 2002, half of the teens who knew of EC did not know that it could be effectively used 72 hours after intercourse, said Ms. Aiken, a researcher in adolescent medicine at Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh.

The 1996 and 2002 surveys were administered to girls aged 13-21 years who attended an adolescent clinic at Children's Hospital. In 1996, the mean age of the 95 girls who completed the survey was 16.1 years. In 2002, 100 teens finished the survey, with a mean age of 16.9 years. A majority of girls in both groups were African American, and about 80% of the girls in both groups said that they were sexually active.

Compared with survey results for 1996, the 2002 findings represented significant increases in the number of respondents who had heard of EC (74% vs. 51%) and used it (13% vs. 3%). Among girls who knew of EC, in 2002 96% knew how to obtain it vs. 81% in 1996. And 53% of the teens in 2002 knew the correct time limit for ...