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Return for Follow-Up Care and Contraceptive Continuation Among Adolescents

University of Washington

Family planning service providers have noted a greater than 50% nonreturn rate among adolescent clients. Those who fail to return to the clinic are likely to discontinue their use of contraceptives and be at riskfor an unintendedpregnancy. Case record reviews of a random sample of adolescent oral contraceptive users were used to investigate variables correlated with nonreturn for follow-up care. Compared to adolescents who returned to the clinic, those least likely to return had a sexually transmitted disease, had irregular menstrual periods, had a pap smear over a year prior to the initial clinic visit, reported more general health problems, were referred for additional tests, and had waited longer since first coitus to obtain birth control. Implications for the development of a method to screen adolescents for risk of contraceptive discontinuation are drawn.

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