BBC: Natural contraception 'effective'

[nkelly]

Hello all,

I was very surprised to find this article showing NFP in a positive light. “A natural family planning method is as effective as the contraceptive pill, German research suggests.”

news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/6375261.stm

It’s about time the public knew just how effective it is and that there’s nothing to fear. There have been so many myths created about the unreliability of NFP. Well done BBC!

God bless,
Noel.

 

[a_Pole_ogist]

… “A natural family planning method is as effective as the contraceptive pill, German research suggests.”

news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/6375261.stm

… Noel.

That’s exactly what I was looking for. Someone (a non-Christian person) asked me on my little forum for non- catholic statistics showing, that NFP is as effective as a pill. Unfortunately I cannot open this link Does anybody knows any other sources about effectiveness of NFP as a contraception method? Thanks.

 

[gilliam]

That’s exactly what I was looking for. Someone (a non-Christian person) asked me on my little forum for non- catholic statistics showing, that NFP is as effective as a pill. Unfortunately I cannot open this link Does anybody knows any other sources about effectiveness of NFP as a contraception method? Thanks.

Link opens fine for me.

 

[nkelly]

And me. I think this post make me a “senior” member again. i.e. 250 posts.

 

[nkelly]

A bit premature, I’m only at 248

 

[a_Pole_ogist]

Either BBC or my Internet connection had slight problem yesterday. Today I also can open that link.

However I would love to see more studies about this subject. Wikipedia quotes study in China showing NFP success rate of 1 and other showing up to 3 pregnances per 100 woman using NFP. I guess women in German study were probably better instructed and educated, but I like to see other studies showing how effective NFP can be.

Chinese research, quoted by Wikipedia, actually shows, if I read it correctly, that women using BOM method (Billings Ovulation Method, whatever that means. Pardon my ignorance, but I’m not expert in this field) have 0,5 pregnancies over a 1 year period for 100 women involved in research. That rate is similar to one quoted by BBC. This is quote from this research:

"4. Comparative Study on BOM and IUD

** 1,654 healthy women of proven fertility (having at least one live birth), aged 24-35 years, with regular menstrual cycles (3-7/24-35 days), to be cohabiting and enjoying their husbands’ support for participation in the trial, were enrolled. The participants were mostly peasants and also workers and white collars with different educational levels (Table 1).

They were randomly divided according to the ratio 3: 2 into two groups (the BOM group, 992 subjects, and the IUD group, 662 subjects). The observation was continued for 12 months.

** ** Results showed that in the BOM group five women became pregnant (all use-related), the pregnancy rate being 0.5%, while in the IUD group there were 12 pregnancies (2%), the difference being highly significant (P < 0.01). From Table 2, it was also seen that the discontinuation due to medical reasons was significantly lower (P < 0.001) in the BOM than in the IUD group.

Besides, in the IUD group, there were 15 expulsions and 38 removals due to severe pain/bleeding; thus the total use-related discontinuations amounted to 65 cases (12 pregnancies, 15 expulsions and 38 medical removals). Nothing particular was seen in the BOM group and only five pregnant cases were medically discontinued."**

Those are links to Wikipedia’s articles and Chinese study:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_birth_control_methods

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fertility_awareness

woomb.org/omrrca/bulletin/vol27/no4/chinaEvaluation.html

 

[nkelly]

Hello, I’d suggest you check out the sympto-thermal method (STM). It uses both temperature jumps and mucous consistency as indicators of impending ovulation.

The effectiveness in avoiding pregnancy depends on how conservative you are in interpreting the signs. In order to be conservative you increase the number of days of abstinence before and after ovulation. The most conservative method avoids intercourse in the phase pre-ovulation (phase 1).

Regards,
Noel.