Use of Paraprofessionals to Motivate Women to Return for Post Partum Checkup: Planned Parenthood Project

Important Variables Influencing Successful Use of Aides

“…Unless the delivery system can accommodate clinic appointments made within 48 hours, the appointments system will exclude some patient participation and thus affect one performance criteria often associated with the skill of a worker. A study by Westheimer and co-workers (26) did not take a systems approach. Their failure to do so forced them to conclude ".…”

How Can Family Planning Programs Delay Repeat Teenage Pregnancies?

“…Home visits, routine phone calls, mailed reminders and group meetings are but a few of the techniques that could be used to identify potential dropouts. 16 About half of the sexually active teenagers surveyed nationally in 1971 did not know or were misinformed about the time of the month when they were most likely to become pregnant.17 Family planning programs for teenagers would appear to be well-advised to place special emphasis on effectively communicating the risks of unprotected coitus for these age groups, and the relationship of fertility and the menstrual cycle. It would also be desirable to equip girls with a short-term as well as a long-term method of contraception.…”

The influence of postpartum home visits on clinic attendance

“…Few recent investigations have examined improved clinic attendance as a possible outcome of postpartum home visitation. Westheimer et al (30), in an experimental study of 1,841 low‐income women who had missed their initial six‐week postpartum examination, found that home visits by paraprofessional community health workers only slightly increased the number of returnees to an inner‐city family planning clinic. In contrast, Moore and colleagues (14), in an experimental study of 1,800 low‐income women, found that significantly more women receiving one postpartum home visit by a paraprofessional “family health counselor” kept their six‐week postpartum clinic appointment than did women who received no such home visit.…”

“…It is difficult to compare the results of these investigations due to methodologic differences and shortcomings. These include the inclusion of large numbers of postabortal clients in the sample and the late timing of home visits (30), unstandardized time at which the actual postpartum visits occurred (14), and a failure to specify reasons for inclusion in experimental (home‐visited) versus control (not‐home‐visited) groups (12). In addition to methodologic caveats, none of the previous works examining postpartum home visitation have involved nurse‐midwives as the providers of that care.…”