Kavita Shah Arora, MD, MBE, MS- Understanding Contraceptive Choice
Provision of postpartum contraception is fundamental to improving maternal and neonatal health. Understanding and assessing a patient's chosen method for contraception is therefore a necessary first step to ensuring access to the desired method. Method-specific characteristics of individual types of contraception as well as financial barriers factor into patient decision-making and have been previously explored. However, other factors impacting decision-making have been less discussed. These include fluctuations in choice through the antepartum and postpartum period, input from partners and family members, benevolent paternalism, implicit bias, and structural racism. Additionally, improved understanding of patient decision-making for postpartum contraception can be extended to other areas of bioethical inquiry surrounding informed consent such as presentation of risk, incorporation of alternative information sources in physician counseling, expressing uncertainty, and decisional regret.