Reducing adolescent pregnancy by increasing clinical best practices and contraception use

Increasing access to reproductive healthcare and contraceptives for adolescents is an integral part of decreasing adolescent pregnancy rates in the United States. As part of a community wide initiative funded through the CDC, the SC Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy is working with health departments in two counties to increase the adolescent caseload and use of highly reliable contraception by teens. Clinic partners committed to increasing the number of clinical best practices utilized to improve the quality of reproductive health services for adolescents at each clinic. Efforts to increase the utilization of health department family planning clinics have resulted in a 7% increase in adolescent patients from baseline in four of the six partner clinics. Meanwhile the South Carolina state health department experienced an 8.8% decline in adolescent patients over the same time period. Two of the clinics adolescent caseload showed an increase of over 10%. This project has also lead to an increase in highly reliable contraception use including long acting reversible contraception (LARC). In three of the six partner clinics patients increased their use of highly reliable contraception to 94%, a 16% increase from baseline over the first two years of the project, with the state average being 83%. Through the utilization of training and technical assistance and engagement of clinical staff in implementing 80% of clinical best practices, one clinic has increased their LARC usage to 17% of their female adolescent caseload.