Barbie's to birth control: Using focus groups with adolescent females to identify the barriers to understanding reproductive and sexual health

Background: The Taking Pride in Prevention Program initiated focus groups with ninth through twelfth grade females at 7 school-based and community sites across the Metropolitan Detroit area based on curriculum adaptations to include reproductive and sexual health education.  The purpose of this project is to better understand the gaps in knowledge and sexual health education services related to use (or lack thereof) of pregnancy prevention methods such as birth control and condoms among female teen ages 13-19. Many of the students have difficulties understanding pregnancy prevention methods because of reproductive health literacy and knowledge limitations. Methods: Through process evaluation and observations the focus group questions were developed based on the inconsistencies in information that students report during program sessions. The data transcribed from five focus group cohort tape-recordings will be transcribed and evaluated to identify the primary themes of each discussion using independent content analysis. Results: Process and observation evaluation data show that students require a simplified version of birth control methods and STI fact sheets. When asked about reproductive health knowledge such as female anatomy, functions of reproductive organs, and the process of menstruation nearly 85% of participants were not able to respond correctly.  Conclusions: Revisions to evidence-based intervention curricula are necessary and must include reproductive health components to increase the knowledge and use of pregnancy prevention methods.  This data is important to help influence not only curriculum adaptations, but possible policies related to health education for students in our programs.