Immediate Postpartum Long-Acting Reversible Contraception: An Effective and Underutilized Strategy

This is the authors' abstract. We don't add key points for this paper.

An innovative strategy to help reduce the rate of unintended short interval pregnancies (pregnancies that occur within 18 months of delivery) has been the introduction of immediate postpartum longacting reversible contraception (IPP-LARC).IPP-LARC is the provision of either an implant or intrauterine device after delivery and in the hospital setting prior to inpatient discharge.This approach ensures access to the most effective reversible contraceptive options available.Implementing IPP-LARC also addresses the low rate of attendance at outpatient postpartum visits and lack of insurance coverage that Medicaid recipients often face in the postpartum period and thereby serves as an effective health equity strategy.Initially, some state Medicaid agencies offered this option, but with a payment model that included coverage within the global fixed delivery reimbursement.This payment model led to ongoing barriers to implementing IPP-LARC given hospital reluctances to cover the high upfront costs of LARC devices.