![\"\"](\"https:\/\/depts.washington.edu\/globalwach\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/Women.png\")
The Challenge<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
The Challenge<\/h2>\nMany women face significant barriers in accessing family planning services to meet their reproductive health needs. As a result, unintended pregnancy rates remain high and more than 220 million women worldwide continue to face an unmet need for contraception and family planning support.<\/p>\n
We develop and test innovative strategies using an implementation science framework to achieve sustainable progress in family planning.\u00a0 We strive to evaluate novel counseling tools and the success of transferable patient-centered care delivery models.\u00a0 These changes will support women and their families make informed reproductive health decisions, and provide access to respectful and dignified family planning care.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Health support technologies and novel data collection tools will bring the health care system closer to women and their families, bring their health concerns to the attention of decision-makers, and reduce the unmet need for family planning.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
By establishing and growing collaborations, we will responsibly scale and integrate these solutions to help women and their families, expand to other regions and populations and cultivate young innovators to ensure the sustainability of this work.\u00a0 Our passion for encouraging young Family Planning (FP) and Maternal-Child Health (MCH) researchers has led to the development of projects that bring family planning and contraceptive information and support to women and their partners, provide daily support to women and newborns during the critical postpartum period, and understand adolescent needs for contraception.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Our implementation science framework for family planning and maternal health focuses on person-centered, novel approaches to reaching women.\u00a0 We design tools and improve health systems to empower and support women through family planning, pregnancy, and the postpartum period.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
<\/p>\n
An asterisk (*) indicates that the study has ended.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n This randomized trial was designed to determine the effect of a systematic provision of tailored one-way SMS or two-way SMS dialogue on uptake of maternal-child health (MCH) strategies including facility delivery, antenatal care attendance, infant immunizations, exclusive breastfeeding, and postpartum family planning uptake. We utilized a novel human-computer hybrid approach to deliver messaging to women targeted at increasing uptake of MCH and FP strategies.<\/p>\n Sponsor: <\/strong>National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (K12HD001264)<\/p>\n Award Years: <\/strong>07\/01\/2013 – 07\/01\/2015<\/p>\n Principal Investigator: <\/strong>Jennifer Unger, Brown University<\/a><\/p>\n <\/p>\n<\/div>\n This randomized trial was designed to determine the effect of a systematic provision of tailored one-way SMS or two-way SMS dialogue on uptake of MCH strategies including facility delivery, antenatal care attendance, infant immunizations, exclusive breastfeeding, and postpartum family planning uptake.\u00a0 We utilized a novel human-computer hybrid approach to deliver messaging to women targeted at increasing uptake of MCH and FP strategies.<\/p>\n Sponsor: <\/strong>United States Agency for International Development<\/p>\n Award Years: <\/strong>07\/01\/2016 – 06\/30\/2019<\/p>\n Principal Investigator:<\/strong> \u00a0Jennifer Unger, Brown University<\/a><\/p>\n <\/p>\n<\/div>\n Mobile WACh XY is a two-arm randomized controlled trial (RCT) comparing the effect of bidirectional SMS dialogue vs. control on highly effective contraceptive use at 6 months postpartum among individual women and couples in Nyanza Province, Kenya.\u00a0 Data from this RCT and accompanying qualitative study will contribute to innovative, scale-able strategies to address unmet need for contraception and increase male involvement in family planning.\u00a0 Mobile WACh XY differentiates itself in the family planning arena by including an emphasis on male partner involvement and couple communication.<\/p>\n Sponsor:\u00a0 <\/strong>Society of Family Planning; National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (K01 AI116298)<\/p>\n Award Years:\u00a0 <\/strong>2016 – 2021<\/p>\n Principal Investigator: <\/strong>Elizabeth Harrington, UW<\/a><\/p>\n <\/p>\n<\/div>\n We will evaluate an SMS platform and reproductive health counseling intervention designed to provide reproductive life counseling and integrated reproductive health\/HIV services in a cluster randomized controlled trial among women receiving routine HIV care, and plan for future implementation with qualitative and health economic analyses.<\/span><\/p>\n Sponsor: <\/strong>National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (R01HD104551<\/a>)<\/p>\n Award Years:\u00a0<\/strong> 06\/01\/2021 – 05\/31\/2026<\/p>\n Principal Investigator: <\/strong>Alison Drake, UW<\/a><\/p>\n <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n <\/p>\n The goal of this study is to develop a deeper understanding of contraceptive behavior, including adherence, experiences of side effects, continuation, and satisfaction, among a cohort of adult women and adolescent girls using modern contraception in western Kenya.\u00a0 We test the feasibility and acceptability of a novel, tailored mobile messaging platform for collecting real-time, ongoing information from women on their family planning experiences.<\/p>\n Sponsor:\u00a0 <\/strong>Gates Grand Challenges Award<\/p>\n Award Years:\u00a0 <\/strong>05\/01\/2017 – 10\/31\/2018<\/p>\n Principal Investigator: <\/strong>Alison Drake, UW<\/a><\/p>\n <\/p>\n<\/div>\n We propose to develop a social media-based group counseling intervention to prevent perinatal depression in adolescents, based on core elements of the MBP curriculum. Leveraging our interdisciplinary collaborative team\u2019s experiences designing and evaluating social media interventions, and providing mental health care to peripartum women and adolescents. Visit the study website to learn more<\/a>.<\/p>\n Sponsor:\u00a0 <\/strong>University of Wisconsin Technology and Adolescent Mental Wellness (TAM) Program<\/p>\n Award Period:\u00a0 <\/strong>06\/01\/2019 – 06\/01\/2021<\/p>\n Principal Investigator: <\/strong>Keshet Ronen, UW<\/a><\/p>\n <\/p>\n<\/div>\n The University of Washington (UW) and Women and Infant\u2019s Hospital (WIH)\/ Brown University team proposes to develop a novel, person-centered, locally derived, comprehensive psychometric scale to improve the accuracy of fertility intentions measurement and utilize the novel scale to refine a reproductive life planning digital counseling tool. Accurate estimates of current fertility intentions are critical to provide appropriate reproductive life counseling to individual women and monitor programmatic success of family planning (FP) programs. Misclassifying a woman\u2019s need for pregnancy prevention may under- or over-estimate gaps in meeting their reproductive health (RH) needs, particularly contraceptive needs, and may lead to coercive provider behaviors and patient misunderstanding and mistrust.<\/span><\/p>\n Sponsor: <\/strong>Gates Foundation<\/p>\n<\/div>\nLeveraging the Mobile WACh Hybrid-Computer Platform to Increase Uptake of MCH and FP Strategies<\/h3>\n
\n\n\nMobile Phone Messaging to Improve Women's and Children's Health (Mobile WACh)*<\/h2>\n
\nCommunication Empowering Mothers and Newborns (Mobile WACh NEO)*<\/h2>\n
\nEvaluation of an mHealth SMS Dialogue Strategy to Meet Women's and Couples' Postpartum Contraceptive Needs in Kenya (Mobile WACh XY)*<\/h2>\n
\nMobile solutions to empower reproductive life planning for women living with HIV (Mobile WACh Empower)<\/h2>\n
<\/div>\nUtilizing Tools to Develop New Interventions<\/h3>\n
\n\n\nMobile Collection of Contraceptive Use, Behaviors, and Experiences in Western Region, Kenya (mCUBE)*<\/h2>\n
\nSocial Media Support for Peripartum Adolescents in Seattle (IMAGINE)*<\/h2>\n
\nImproving accuracy in measurement of fertility intentions and delivery of reproductive life planning counseling (HerChoice)*<\/h2>\n