Biomedical Sciences ETDs

Publication Date

Summer 7-6-2022

Abstract

Women report significant barriers to obtaining hormonal contraception prescriptions, including difficulty scheduling clinician appointments, inconvenient clinic hours and desire to avoid pelvic examinations. To increase contraceptive access, states throughout the United States have and continue to pass legislation authorizing pharmacists to prescribe hormonal contraception, allowing women to initiate contraception directly at the pharmacy without involvement of a physician. Despite patient and pharmacist interest in direct pharmacy access to contraception, many pharmacists report challenges to prescribing contraception. Few studies have assessed the uptake of pharmacy-prescribed contraception in states with expanded pharmacist prescriptive authority, but no prior studies have evaluated the implementation process of establishing pharmacist-prescribed hormonal contraception.

This thesis evaluates the current literature on the availability of pharmacist-prescribed hormonal contraception in the United States, presents research on implementation of pharmacist-prescribed contraception, and discusses the importance of understanding implementation for future legislative policy changes.

Keywords

contraception, pharmacist prescribing, family planning, implementation

Document Type

Thesis

Language

English

Degree Name

Biomedical Sciences

First Committee Member (Chair)

Lisa Hofler, MD, MPH, MBA

Second Committee Member

Eve Espey, MD, MPH

Third Committee Member

Andrew Sussman, PhD

Fourth Committee Member

Alexandra Herman, PharmD

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