Back to Annual Meeting Page		American Public Health Association 133rd Annual Meeting & Exposition December 10-14, 2005 Philadelphia, PA

Abstract #111338

Qian Geng, MEd, Jianzhong Chen, Gregoria Lyssikatos, MA, and Lisa M. Mueller, MA. PATH, 1800 K Street NW, Suite 800, Washington, DC 20006, 202-822-0033, glyssikatos@path-dc.org

Shanghai is one of the largest cities in the world, with an approximate population of 14 million. Adolescents account for about 20 percent (2.8 million) of this population. With such a large adolescent population, adolescent reproductive health (ARH) issues such as increasing STI rates and unwanted pregnancies have become more critical, creating an urgent need for reproductive health education and accessible services for young people.

In Shanghai, the family planning association (FPA) has used LPS as the key approach for implementing a large-scale ARH project covering all 19 city districts. In addition to using LPS to reach young people, the FPA has worked intensively through advocacy and media to reach policy makers and influential community members to create a supportive environment for youth to access sexual and reproductive health information and services. The FPA has also addressed the expanding need for youth-friendly services by providing services accessible to and geared toward young people. Youth are informed at the LPS training sessions about the availability of YFS and encouraged to use those services if they need to, ensuring that they have the ability to follow through on lessons learned in the LPS trainings.

By sharing quantitative research findings from the project, this presentation will demonstrate the positive impact LPS had on youth. It will also illustrate how advocacy created a supportive policy environment to address youth's reproductive health needs, and discuss what youth-friendly services mean and how they help youth.

Learning Objectives: Participants attending this session will be able to

• Describe the model and strategies used to implement a large-scale youth project in the largest city in China.
• Identify the present situation of ARH and its expected development in Shanghai.
• Adapt lessons from this project to other adolescent reproductive health (ARH) projects.

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

I wish to disclose that I have NO financial interests or other relationship with the manufactures of commercial products, suppliers of commercial services or commercial supporters.