North Texas Research Forum 2025
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Division
North Texas
Hospital
Medical City Arlington
Specialty
Obstetrics & Gynecology
Document Type
Poster
Publication Date
2025
Keywords
postpartum visit, postpartum contraception, postpartum care
Disciplines
Medicine and Health Sciences | Obstetrics and Gynecology | Quality Improvement
Abstract
Introduction: ACOG recommends prenatal discussions with patients regarding their lifetime reproductive plans and postpartum contraception. Up to 40% of patients are not seen for postpartum visits and this rate is highest amongst populations with limited resources (ACOG Practice Bulletin: Optimizing Postpartum Care). By having consistent documentation amongst our clinic providers we aim to maximize patient education and choice in their postpartum contraception. Methods: The providers at our clinic were educated on where to document postpartum contraception discussions on the obstetric flow sheet under the “problems” tab. Providers were to document the discussion even if the patient declined postpartum contraception. Every patient that was seen in our clinic for obstetric care was added to a database and sorted by their estimated delivery date. Patients that were only seen for one visit and thus did not receive prenatal care at our clinic were excluded. The charts of the remaining patients were audited for documentation of a postpartum contraception discussion. If documentation of a postpartum contraception plan was documented anywhere else on the chart this was noted but considered inadequate. Patients were grouped by the month of their EDD and a report was generated for percentage of patients with no documented plan, inadequately documented plan, and adequately documented plan. Results: Data was collected starting with patients with an EDD of July 2023 through April 2024. A total of 203 patients were in the data set. Nine were excluded because they were only seen in the clinic for one visit and did not continue their prenatal care with our clinic. For July through October postpartum contraception plans were still being documented inadequately. By November all contraception plans were documented adequately if any plan was documented at all. The month with the highest percentage of adequately documented plans was in February with 67% of the patients having adequately documented plans. Conclusion: This data shows that we were able to successfully standardize how our providers document prenatal discussions of postpartum contraception. This allows our providers to better identify gaps in care and educate our patients on their contraceptive options. Future areas of study would be to see if consistent documentation leads to higher rates of adequate postpartum contraception.
Original Publisher
HCA Healthcare Graduate Medical Education
Recommended Citation
Johnson, Rebecca; Kremer, Timothy; and Tenzel, Nicole, "Improving Patients’ Postpartum Contraception Plans and Access to Postpartum Contraception" (2025). North Texas Research Forum 2025. 104.
https://scholarlycommons.hcahealthcare.com/northtexas2025/104