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  • Title: [Lactation-induced amenorrhea as birth control method].
    Author: van Unnik GA, van Roosmalen J.
    Journal: Ned Tijdschr Geneeskd; 1998 Jan 10; 142(2):60-2. PubMed ID: 9556994.
    Abstract:
    Improving access to quality care in family planning, a recent document of the World Health Organization, reviews the epidemiological and clinical evidence relevant to medical eligibility of well established contraceptive methods. Breastfeeding is widely regarded as unreliable for individual contraception. The document, however, argues that the lactational amenorrhoea method (LAM) is a safe and effective family planning method. Worldwide, LAM is the most important way of fertility regulation and its efficacy is confirmed in many studies, with a 2% risk of pregnancy in the first six months after birth. Taking into account certain well defined conditions (frequent feedings, no supplementary feeding before 4-6 months, method only to be used in the absence of menstruation), LAM can be relied on for contraceptive protection for up to 1 year post partum. In 1966 WHO published a document on improving access to quality care in family planning, which who pronounced to be a fundamental human right. According to this document, despite the assortment of reliable contraceptives worldwide 350 million people have unmet need for contraception because of lack of access or availability. Adequate reproductive health depends not only access to contraceptives, but also on adequate screening and treatment of anemia, sexually transmitted diseases, and cervical carcinoma. Among 8 groups of birth control methods studied, the lactational amenorrhea method (LAM) was dealt with in detail. The underlying mechanism lies in the stimulation that breastfeeding brings about and in breastfeeding's suppression of the release of gonadotropin- releasing hormone and of dopamine (the prolactin inhibiting factor). A 1974 investigation in Rwanda demonstrated that 50% of rural women who breast fed their children frequently got pregnant within 23 months of childbirth and that 50% of city women became pregnant 9 months postpartum. The Bellagio consensus has stated that LAM provides 98% protection against pregnancy in the first 6 months postpartum as long as breast feeding is the exclusive feeding method practiced. A 1992 analysis of 9 prospective studies reported that 6 months postpartum only 0.7% of the women using LAM became pregnant. LAM still plays a crucial role in Africa, where the average number of children per woman is 6. Without breastfeeding the estimated figure would be 10.
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