Projects
Contraceptive ACCESS Training Program
We partnered with advisory boards of adolescents, parents, and clinicians across North Carolina to develop a training program in adolescent-centered contraceptive care. Contraceptive ACCESS (Adolescent-Centered Counseling and Empowerment Skills for Success) is a 3-hour virtual, synchronously, highly engaging training program that covers five topic areas: 1) reproductive justice, 2) person-centered contraceptive counseling, 3) supporting teens with online information, 4) up to date contraceptive knowledge, 5) implementation considerations including adolescent-friendly clinic environments, confidentiality, and privacy. We send monthly email updates and created a resource . If you are interested in attending a training session for Contraceptive ACCESS, contact us at adolresearch@unc.edu. (Funding: NIH/NCATS 1K12TR004416).
Adolescent-Centered Pregnancy Options Counseling
With the support of the 黑料网 pediatrics residency program, and resident champions, we deliver a 2-hour interactive, case-based training program to 黑料网’s pediatric interns annually on how to do adolescent-centered pregnancy options counseling. It focuses on values clarification, didactic teaching, and case-based learning and practice with trained actors. We have evaluated the program in a multisite study with the University of Pittsburgh and Indiana University that showed immediate and sustained change in knowledge and abilities. We are applying for new funding to develop and test a measure to assess quality of pregnancy options counseling for adolescents and young adults. We are also applying for funding to study the training in a hybrid effectiveness-implementation trial. If you are a pediatric residency program interested in participating in the efficacy trial, contact us at adolresearch@unc.edu
Implementing Person-Centered Contraceptive Counseling
We, as part of an interdisciplinary team, will implement a Quality Improvement project within a single very large multidisciplinary clinic at 黑料网 to assess changes in patient-reported from baseline to during and after a series of PDSA cycles. Implementation will include clinician and staff education, use of decision support tools, and EHR prompts to promote documentation of patient preferences, past experiences, and method selection. Dr. Allison is also mentoring an adolescent medicine fellow to complete a similar project at a subspecialty clinic in Washington D.C.
Past Projects
Adolescent awareness of the changing abortion legal landscape in the U.S and its implications
We partnered with the platform to field three sets of questions to 14- to 24-year olds during the 6 months around the Dobbs decision. We found that most adolescents were aware of the changing abortion laws, and identified the sources of information, support, and resources they would need if seeking an abortion in the current legal landscape. More information about the study and links to our scholarly products can be found .
Adolescent-serving clinicians’ contraceptive and pregnancy options counseling
We used semi-structured interviews and a discrete choice experiment survey to better understand patterns in adolescent-serving clinician counseling on contraception. We analyzed the data using mixed methods approaches. We found that despite a desire to provide equitable care, pediatricians frequently used non-person-centered techniques to counsel adolescents, and often provide non-comprehensive pregnancy options counseling.
Black adolescent females鈥� experiences with sexual and reproductive health counseling in primary care
We conducted semi-structured interviews of adolescents across North Carolina, using recruitment through social media platforms. We found that Black adolescent females had mixed experiences with counseling, though most reported incomplete or judgmental sexual and reproductive health care.
Single-visit initiation of long-acting reversible contraception during COVID-19
We performed quantitative analysis of retrospective electronic medical record data to better understand patterns in LARC initiation within our health system. We found LARC was frequently offered as single-visit both before and during COVID, though differential placement by subgroup was detected.