Session-VI

Miscellaneous/Natural Methods in Family Planning

Introduction:

1. Abstinence:
It means no sexual activity. Abstinence means not having any kind of sex and not engaging in any activity that puts
you or your partner in contact with either of your body fluids such as semen, vaginal fluids and blood. It is a way to
postpone pregnancy.
Advantages:
 It is 100% effective method to avoid unintended pregnancy.
 Prevents the occurrence of sexually transmitted infections including HIV.
Disadvantages:
 It is very difficult to implement this method
 Suppression of a natural force may result in mood shifts and nervous breakdown.

2. Coitus interruptus or withdrawal method:

It means during sexual act, just before ejaculation the man takes his penis out of vagina. This action will prevent entry
of sperm entering the woman.
Advantages:
 All time readily available method
 No devices needed
 No cost
 No Chemical application
 Reduces the risk of sexually transmitted diseases
Disadvantages:
 The probability of pregnancy is high with incorrect or inconsistent use
 Men need to be alert in performing the act.

3. Lactational Amenorrhea:
During lactation the elevated levels of prolactin and decreased levels of gonadotropin-releasing hormone at
hypothalamus suppress ovulation. the Duration of this suppression differs. Principally the suppression is influenced by
by the frequency and duration of breast feeding. Once the woman gets first menses she must adopt another method of
birth control to avoid pregnancy .the failure rate within first 6 months is 0.5% if adopted in a correct way.

Advantages:
 This method helps in promotion of involution of the uterus
 Menses is suppressed
 Easy to adopt after child birth
 Helps in post-partum weight reduction
Disadvantages:
 Cannot say exactly when woman returns to fertility
 Women may not like to feed frequently as well for longer duration
 This is not suitable if the mother has human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) Infection.
4. Biological Methods:
In this method periodic abstinence and avoidance of intercourse during women’s fertile period is practiced. Fertile
period is meant to be around the time of ovulation. Different techniques used to determine the fertile period include
the calendar method, cervical mucus method and the basal body temperature method.
They include:
 Calendar method
 Basal body temperature
 Cervical mucus method
 Calendar (rhythm) method:
To follow this method one must have knowledge of exact ovulation day and avoid intercourse during the fertile days
before and ovulation.
The menses dates are recorded for 6 cycles (6 Months) to estimate the fertile period. To know the earliest day of
the fertile period 18 days are substracted from the shortest menstrual cycle. The latest day of the fertile period is
calculated by substracting 11 from the longest cycle.
Use the formula: shortest cycle minus 18. Longest cycle minus 11. Suppose a woman’s menstural’scycle varies
from 27 -31: 27-18=9; 31-11=20. So from 9th to 20th day is her fertile period during which she should avoid
unprotected sex. Day one is counted from the first day of menstruation.
Make a bracelet of 28 rings or beads from three different colors (proportion-5:12:11). In our example-red-5, yellow-
12, green-11. In the above example red denotes menstruation, yellow safe period and green refers unsafe period where
unprotected sex is avoided. At the start day put safety pin to remind her from where to initiate the counting.
Where such calculations are not possible advice couple to avoid unprotected sex between 8th to 22nd day of the
menstrual cycle.

Advantage:
Does not require any device

Disadvantages:
 Woman’s menstrual cycle must be regular
 It is possible only for educated and responsible people
 It has high failure rate

Cervical Mucus Method:

In this method woman looks for any changes in her cervical mucosal secretions. The woman predicts her fertile
period by assessing the cervical mucus with her fingers. Cervical mucus looks watery, clear, thin & transparent during
ovulation. Then the mucus becomes scant and dry under the influence of progesterone, which remains until the onset of
the next menses.

Basal Body Temperature Method:

This method considers rise in body temperature as the indication to identify the occurrence of ovulation. Woman
is advised to check her temperature early in the morning after an undisturbed 5 hours of rest and sleep. Any
increase in temperature says that the ovulation had occurred. The hormone progesterone causes 0.5 C of increase in
temperature. This method requires couple to adopt abstinence method during the pre-ovulatory period. It is actually
reliable if couple have sex only during post-ovulatory infertile period.

Advantages:
 There is no adverse effects that occur from hormones
 Acceptable to couples for cultural or religious reasons
 Fertility returns immediately after stopping practice of the method
Disadvantages:
 This appropriate only for women who have regular cycles
 Complete abstinence or contraception is required during the fertile period
 Requires systematic discipline
 Ineffective with improper use
 Has high failure rate
 This does not provide protection to couple against sexually transmitted disease(STD’s)