Family planning providers may be able to help pregnant patients plan hospital transportation in advance, she says. A woman's ability to reach obstetric care often depends on help from the community. Since most life-threatening complications occur during labor and delivery, every pregnant women needs rapid access to emergency obstetric care. After a woman has given birth, family planning providers can play an important role in counseling about birth spacing and contraceptives. LAM is highly effective during the first six months postpartum as long as a woman has not resumed menstruation and is fully or nearly fully breastfeeding.
Priorities There are many ways to define reproductive health.
Different definitions and priorities are being proposed by women's health advocates and family planning organizations around the globe. One approach, articulated by FHI's Dr. Hardee and Kathryn Yount of Johns Hopkins University School of Hygiene and Public Health, uses the consensus statement from the United Nation's 1994 International Conference on Population and Development to identify possible services. Achieving these goals will require a wise use of resources, which may include ways to integrate different reproductive services. For example, family planning programs and other reproductive health projects may be able to share certain services, such as maintaining a central file of patient records. The policies and administrative structure of each country will play a role in determining how different health services are combined.