From the Experts

Helping Teens Think about Using Long-Acting Reversible Contraceptives

[Feburary 18, 2010 ] Collectively, these methods are referred to as LARCs (long-acting reversible contraceptives). All of these methods can be safely used by teens and all of these methods have less than a 1% failure rate for typical users.

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Develop Social Marketing Campaigns for Youth

[ January 27, 2010 ] The toolkit is a step-by-step guide to developing low-budget prevention campaigns for youth with an emphasis on sexual and reproductive health.

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A New Toolkit for Evaluating Health Education Materials

[ October 5, 2009 ] The California Family Health Council, Inc. (CFHC) is pleased to announce a new resource entitled Evaluating Health Education Materials: A Toolkit on Meeting the Title X Information and Education Guidelines.

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Helping Parents Get the Conversation Started

[ September 15, 2009 ] All children need information about sex and growing up. They need to hear about it from their parents. Children whose parents talk to them about sex make better choices later on.

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Improving Outreach in Family Planning Clinics

[ July 6, 2009 ] Reaching out to the community is essential for increasing access to the health services your community needs. It can help you build your client base and maintain strong relationships with existing clients. Even though outreach may seem difficult, there are small, simple things that your clinic can do to improve its community outreach.

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Talking to Older Clients About Sexuality

[ June 10, 2009 ] Despite common assumptions, both women and men can and do enjoy healthy, happy and very satisfying sexual lives as they get older. As health care providers, it’s important to continue to talk to older clients about sex and sexuality.

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Promoting the Reproductive Health of Young Adults

[ April 16, 2009 ] Young adults – that is, people in their late teens and early twenties – face special risks when it comes to their reproductive health. Young adults aged 18-24 are at increased risk for sexually transmitted infections and unwanted pregnancy.

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STD Risk Reduction Counseling in the Family Planning Visit

[ March 23, 2009 ] Behaviors that put clients at risk for pregnancy may also put them at risk for STDs. When you talk to clients about birth control, you have a perfect opportunity to offer them information about STDs. You can include risk reduction counseling in your visits and help clients reduce their risk of getting an STD.

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Improving Your Clinic’s Response to Intimate Partner Violence

[ February 8, 2009 ] Intimate Partner Violence (IPV) is a critical issue that continues to impact the provision of family planning services. There are a number of steps health care providers can take to make their facility more successful and client-friendly when it comes to screening and intervention for IPV.

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Talk to Your Clients about Essure

[ January 28, 2009 ] Do you have clients who are interested in sterilization? If so, let them know about Essure, a new, non-surgical sterilization procedure.

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Helping Parents Understand the HPV Vaccine

[ December 16, 2008 ] January is National Cervical Cancer Awareness month. It can be a great time to discuss the HPV vaccine with your clients. Since the HPV vaccine is recommended for pre-teens and young women, talking to parents about the vaccine is especially important.

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Making the Most of the Hepatitis B (HBV) Vaccine

[ November 20, 2008 ] The United States has seen a 78% decline in the rates of acute hepatitis B virus (HBV), largely due to increased use of the Hepatitis B vaccine by health care.providers. Many adults, however, remain vulnerable and may need more information about heptatitis B and the HBV vaccine when they come to your clinic.

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Tips on Evaluating Written Health Education Materials

[ November 4, 2008 ] As a health care provider, you want your clients to have high-quality, easy-to-read, and culturally appropriate health education materials. Here is a four-step process that you can follow when you evaluate written health education materials.

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Helping Lactating Mothers Use LAM

[ September 18, 2008 ] The Lactation Amenorrhea Method (LAM) is one of several effective methods breast-feeding mothers can use. Safe and easy to use, if used correctly, it can be effective for up to 6 months after the birth of the baby.

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Pregnancy Options Counseling: Tips for Improving Your Skills

[ August 21, 2008 ] The health worker plays an important role in helping clients who are facing an unexpected pregnancy. Clients need accurate, unbiased information as well as sensitive attention and compassion in order to make the best decision.

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Making the Standard Days Method (SDM) and CycleBeads Part of Your Practice

[ June 11, 2008 ] The Standard Days Method (SDM)® is a new, fertility awareness-based method of family planning developed through scientific analysis of the fertile time in the woman’s menstrual cycle.

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Meeting the Linguistic and Cultural Needs of Clients

[ November 21, 2007 ] Cultural and linguistic barriers can limit your ability to meet the needs of your clients and can lower the chances clients will benefit from the services you provide them. By improving our understanding of cultural and linguistic competency, we can provide high-quality health care that is truly effective, cost-efficient, and most importantly, accessible to the people we serve.

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Making the Birth Control Implant Part of Your Practice

[ August 30, 2007 ] In the clinical trials of Implanon involving 2,300 women, no pregnancies occurred during use in over approximately 73,000 monthly cycles. Since 1998, two and a half million women have successfully used the implant in countries all over the world.

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What Your Clients Need to Know About the Birth Control Implant

[ August 30, 2007 ] Here are some of the basics about this method that your clients will find helpful to know.

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The Hidden Half: Male Involvement in Family Planning

[ June 15, 2007 ] As a health care professional, you know the importance of male involvement in family planning. We all know that women don’t get pregnant by themselves. But we may have trouble bringing men into the family planning equation for a variety of reasons.

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Chronic Illness Management and Low Health Literacy

[ April 11, 2007 ] Chronic disease affects the quality of life of ninety million American adults, and accounts for 7 of 10 deaths in the United States. Self-management of chronic disease is a critical aspect of successful care. However, an inability to understand how to care for oneself or a loved one with a chronic illness can seriously affect even the best intentions and efforts of their physicians.

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Fostering Parent-Child Communication: Your Role as a Healthcare Provider

[ January 24, 2007 ] A large body of evidence is building that identifies parent-child connectedness as a key determinant or "protective factor" that influences adolescent risk-taking behavior. Although at first glance it may not appear to be an obvious fit, but you can play a role in fostering parent-child communication.

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HPV and Cervical Cancer: What Your Clients Need to Know

[ November 6, 2006 ] Mostly likely you’ve heard HPV mentioned in the news recently. But what is HPV? And what should your clients know about it? This article will give you the facts you need.

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Keeping Kids Safe and Healthy:
Closer Parent-Child Communication Reduces Teen Pregnancy and STDs

[ October 6, 2006 ] In a national survey of teens, 80% said their decisions about sex and relationships are influenced by what their parents have told them and what their parents might think. In fact, teens report that their parents influence their decisions about sex more than their friends, the media, or their siblings.

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Supervising and Mentoring Health Educators: Tips for Improving Services

[ August 15, 2006 ] What makes your health education staff so much better than a walking, talking brochure? It’s their education and counseling skills - their ability to go beyond the facts and help clients use health information in a way that makes sense in their own lives.

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Cultural Competency - The Need of the Hour!

[ July 17, 2006 ] In the last decade, the United States has gone through significant changes in its demographic landscape. Our communities are more diverse now than ever before. Research has shown that while most people have difficulty navigating the US healthcare system, ethnic communities are particularly vulnerable for a variety of reasons.

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The High Cost of Low Health Literacy: What We Can Do

[ May 18, 2006 ] The majority of American adults are either functionally illiterate or substantially limited in their ability to meet the demands of everyday life, according to the National Adult Literacy Survey conducted in 2000. In California, about 1 in 4 adults function at the lowest levels of literacy.

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