Knowledge, acceptability and use of the Billings natural family planning  method

Nelson Shozo Uchimura; Taqueco Teruya Uchimura; Lívia Maria Martins Almeida; Danilo Marco Perego; Liza Yurie Teruya Uchimura

doi:10.1590/s1983-14472011000300012

Fertility Awareness Use and Experience

Knowledge, acceptability and use of the Billings natural family planning method

Uchimura NS, Uchimura TT, Almeida LM, Perego DM, Uchimura LY

Published September 2011 Revista Gaucha De Enfermagem, 32(3), 516-523

DOI 10.1590/s1983-14472011000300012 PMID 22165398

RRM Academy Synopsis

Brazilian hospital patients accepted the Billings method at 62%

A 2008 questionnaire study of 113 women at a Brazilian university hospital found that about 6 out of 10 women accepted the Billings method after a short explanation. Only 1 woman used it routinely. Acceptance was higher among women using no contraceptive method and among women who wanted a future pregnancy.

Key Findings

Of 113 women analyzed, 70 (62%) accepted the Billings method and 43 (38%) did not; 1 woman (0.9%) used natural family planning routinely.
Acceptance was 80% (28 women) among women using no contraceptive method and 53.8% (42 women) among women using one (p = 0.0147).
Acceptance was 80.6% (25 women) among women who wanted a future pregnancy, 58.6% (41 women) among those who did not and 33.3% (4 women) among those unsure (p = 0.0105).
Among 117 women interviewed, 110 (94.0%) had no prior knowledge of the method, and 111 said their physicians had not informed them about it; 6 (5.1%) had been informed.
Age, education, marital status, number of living children, religion and church attendance showed no statistically significant association with acceptance (p = 0.1538 to 0.8779).

Interpretation

Women at a university hospital in Maringá, Brazil, answered a structured questionnaire. Four of the 117 women were not interested in learning about natural family planning. Interviewers gave the other 113 a short explanation of the Billings method and recorded whether each accepted it. The authors link the low use to a lack of information among health professionals. Of the 43 women who declined, 30 said the method was not reliable or effective enough. The authors note that the women included patients with gynecologic conditions, pregnant women and postpartum women, and they propose studies of healthy women in their reproductive years.

RRM Context

The Billings Ovulation Method is a fertility awareness-based method. A woman identifies her fertile days by watching her own cervical mucus. Restorative reproductive medicine builds on this body literacy and treats cycle charting as part of cause-based reproductive care. Women learn the method through teaching, so access depends on clinicians and teachers who know it and offer it.

Our editorial summary of this paper, not the article's abstract.

Abstract

This is an observational quantitative and analytical study aimed at verifying the knowledge, acceptability and use of natural family planning (NFP) by patients in a university hospital from July to November, 2008. The data were collected using a structured questionnaire and analyzed with the softwares Excel and Statistica 8.0. Of the 113s women interviewed, 70 (62%) accepted the method and 1 (0.9%) used it routinely. Acceptance was higher among those who wished to become pregnant in the future compared to those who did not wish it. Acceptability was statistically significant (p = 0.0147) among the 28 (80%) non-contraceptive users compared to 42 (53.8%) who used some contraceptive method. Factors such as age, education, number of living children and religion were not statiscally associated with the acceptability of NFP. The Billings ovulation method has an adequate acceptability, but has a low actual use because of the lack of information by health professionals of its real effectiveness and applicability.

Topics

Fertility Awareness Use and Experience User Satisfaction

Fertility Awareness › Use and Experience › User Satisfaction

Nelson Shozo Uchimura, Taqueco Teruya Uchimura, Lívia Maria Martins Almeida, Danilo Marco Perego, Liza Yurie Teruya Uchimura

N Uchimura, T Uchimura, L Almeida, D Perego, L Uchimura

PMID 22165398 22165398 DOI 10.1590/s1983-14472011000300012 10.1590/s1983-14472011000300012 Uchimura et al. 2011, Uchimura 2011

Knowledge, acceptability and use of the Billings natural family planning method

Brazilian hospital patients accepted the Billings method at 62%

Key Findings

Interpretation

RRM Context

Abstract

Topics

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