Date of Award

1-1-2024

Document Type

Open Access Thesis

Degree Name

Medical Doctor (MD)

Department

Medicine

First Advisor

Alla Vash-Margita

Second Advisor

Meredithe McNamara

Abstract

Adolescents and young adults (AYAs), here defined as aged 13-25 years, face uniquechallenges in accessing sexual and reproductive health information. Interactive internet resources provide a free, private and personalized opportunity to help AYAs make informed contraception choices. We designed an original website called “Teen Health” to provide age-appropriate and evidence-based SRH education to AYAs, as well as an interactive contraception education tool (CET). We introduced “Teen Health” to AYAs in a clinical setting and observed trends in contraception preference after website exposure. We hypothesized that “Teen Health” would support informed contraception decision-making.

A convenience sample of AYAs were recruited from pediatric and adolescent gynecologyand adolescent medicine clinics affiliated with a tertiary care children’s hospital over a six-month period. Participants were asked to provide their contraception preferences before and after website exposure, as well as qualitative feedback on the “Teen Health” website.

128 participants with a mean age of 15.95 years participated in this study. There wasdiverse representation of participant sexualities and gender identities in this study. Pre- and postwebsite exposure contraception preferences were significantly different (P

“Teen Health” was well-received by AYAs in a clinical setting and supports informedcontraception decision-making. There are opportunities to expand this study to encapsulate a broader AYA population.

Comments

This is an Open Access Thesis.

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