Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t7czq Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-24T13:45:20.777Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

18 - Family planning and contraceptive choice

from Part V - Family planning, pregnancy, and parenting

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 November 2009

Pamela M. Crawford
Affiliation:
Department of Neurology, Special Centre for Epilepsy, York District Hospital, Wigginton Road, York YO3 7HE, England
Martha J. Morrell
Affiliation:
Columbia University, New York
Kerry L. Flynn
Affiliation:
Columbia-Presbyterian Cancer Center, New York
Get access

Summary

Many women assume that they will have the opportunity to decide whether, and when, to have a child. Modern forms of contraceptives provide safe and effective birth control. The most popular form of contraceptive is the birth control pill. Introduced in the 1960s, these hormone-containing products rapidly became one of the preferred forms of family planning. Initial concerns that the estrogen hormones in these pills increased the risk for blood clotting and stroke led to the development of pills that contained very low doses of hormones. These products may lessen the very small risk of side effects, and the dose of hormone is no more than is absolutely necessary to stop ovulation.

In the 1980s physicians began to notice that women with epilepsy taking antiepileptic drugs and using birth control pills had more unplanned pregnancies than expected. Only one out of 100 women using birth control pills become pregnant each year – most by forgetting to take the pill on one or several days. However, women with epilepsy taking antiepileptic drugs had six or more failures per year per 100 women. Physicians quickly realized that some antiepileptic drugs increased the breakdown of the hormones contained within the birth control pill. Women were subsequently counseled that birth control pills could not be used safely when taking particular antiepileptic drugs. Unfortunately, many physicians still do not know about this interaction.

In this chapter, Dr Pamela Crawford reviews this complex and important topic. She stresses that each woman must know whether her medical therapy can interfere with hormonal contraception.[…]

Type
Chapter
Information
Women with Epilepsy
A Handbook of Health and Treatment Issues
, pp. 197 - 202
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2003

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×