ACCESS, QUALITY OF CARE AND MEDICAL BARRIERS IN FAMILY-PLANNING PROGRAMS

Access to family planning, quality of care and medical barriers to services are key factors in the adoption of contraceptive use. Access helps determine whether the individual makes contact with the family planning provider, while quality of care greatly affects the client's decision to accept a method and the motivation to continue using it. Medical barriers are scientifically unjustifiable policies or practices, based at least in part on a medical rationale, that inappropriately prevent clients from receiving the contraceptive method of their choice or impose unnecessary process barriers to access to family planning services. In the past, international family planning efforts have been criticized as placing too much emphasis on issues of access and the quantity of contraceptives distributed. The climate now exists for pursuing improvements in quality and access simultaneously and for exploring through research the linkages between access, quality and medical barriers.