The Contents and Influence of the Perinatal Contraceptive Infosphere

The perinatal period constitutes a critical opportunity to support pregnant and postpartum people's management of their reproductive futures, with implications for maternal and infant health. Patient's contraceptive infospheres —the dynamic ecosystem of contraceptive information sources they interact with—are critical components of patient context and should be accounted for in the provision of person-centered contraceptive counseling. This narrative scoping literature review takes a comprehensive look at peer-reviewed literature on sources of contraceptive information during the perinatal period and postpartum contraceptive decision making. We describe populations in which perinatal contraceptive information behaviors have been studied, outline sources of contraceptive information used during the perinatal period and their role within the perinatal contraceptive infosphere, and summarize the influences of perinatal contraceptive information on key outcomes such as contraceptive experiences, knowledge, attitudes, and postpartum method uptake. Our database searches generated 877 unique articles; 83 full texts were reviewed, 20 of which were eligible. Nine additional articles were added from reference lists and context expertise, resulting in 29 total articles from which key information was abstracted. The reviewed literature largely focused on clinical contraceptive counseling, which indicated that patients prefer individualized direct patient-clinician counseling in the antepartum period and may feel overwhelmed when discussing contraception immediately postpartum. People also used nonclinical sources of contraceptive information (peers, family, partners, and online sources). Further research is needed to elaborate on the dynamics of contraceptive information source use and preferences throughout the perinatal period and to elucidate how various sources within the infosphere are used and influence postpartum contraceptive decision making.