The 131st Annual Meeting (November 15-19, 2003) of APHA

Abstract #71252

Bruce Trigg, MD, STD Program, District 1, New Mexico Department of Health, 1111 Stanford Drive, NE, Albuquerque, NM 87106, 505-841-4112, brucet@DOH.STATE.NM.US, Eve Espey, MD, MPH, Department of OB-GYN - 4ACC, University of New Mexico, 2211 Lomas Ave. NE, Albuquerque, NM 87131, and Dale Tinker, New Mexico Pharmaceutical Association, 4800 Zuni SE, Albuquerque, NM 87108.

Women in New Mexico will soon have increased access to emergency contraception (EC) through the most deregulated system of pharmacist prescribing authority in the nation. In the fall of 2002, the NM State Boards of Pharmacy, Nursing, and Medical Examiners approved regulations allowing pharmacists to provide EC under a Board of Pharmacy Protocol. The final approval of this protocol, now pending, will enable any pharmacist who has completed the required training, to provide EC to the general public. The single statewide protocol will encourage participation in the program and will help to standardize pharmacy based EC services.

Collaborative efforts by the NM Department of Health, the NM Pharmaceutical Association, the University of New Mexico Health Sciences Center, Planned Parenthood, and community-based advocacy groups to address barriers to EC access are underway. A recent investigative study of pharmacy access to EC in Albuquerque revealed that only 11% of prescriptions for EC that were presented to pharmacies by researchers were actually filled. The study also found that the most often cited reason for lack of availability of the preferred EC products was a lack of requests for EC. Therefore efforts are now being directed to increasing the awareness of EC among primary care clinicians. Legislation is currently pending before the state legislature to allocate funds for a public information campaign about EC and to require that EC be made available to victims of sexual assault in all emergency rooms.

Learning Objectives:

• At the conclusion of this session, the participant in this session will be able to:
• 1) Describe the New Mexico approach to pharmacist prescriptive authority for Emergency Contraception (EC).
• 2) Be able to identify some of the barriers to EC access faced by women in New Mexico
• 3) Discuss the collaborative efforts to increase awareness of EC to potential users and medical professionals.

Presenting author's disclosure statement:
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.