Birth Control Options for Women - Natural Family Planning Methods

Natural Family Planning Methods

Natural family planning contraceptive methods do not use medication, physical devices, or surgery to prevent pregnancy. Instead, these cycle-based fertility awareness methods rely on tracking the changes in the body that signal fertility. A woman is only fertile during part of her menstrual cycle. By monitoring certain changes in her body, a woman can more or less predict the fertile phase and abstain from sexual intercourse during that time. She can also use barrier methods if they are not prohibited by religious beliefs. The Catholic Church, for example, generally approves of most natural family planning methods.

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Natural family planning methods include:

• Basal body temperature
• Cervical mucus
• Symptothermal
• Lactational amenorrhea
• Calendar

Basal Body Temperature Method. To determine the most likely time of ovulation and therefore the time of fertility, a woman is instructed to take her body temperature, called her basal body temperature. This is the body's temperature as it rises and falls in accord with hormonal fluctuations.

• Each morning before rising, the woman takes her temperature with a specialized basal body thermometer and marks the result on a graph-paper chart.
• She also notes the days of menstruation and sexual activity.
• The so-called "fertile window" is 6 days long. It starts 5 days before ovulation and ends the day of ovulation.
• The chances for fertility are considered to be highest between days 10 - 17 in the menstrual cycle (with day 1 being the first day of the period and ovulation occurring about 2 weeks later). However, a 2000 study reported that only 30% of women were fertile within that period of time. In the study, women had a 10% chance of ovulating on each day between day 6 and 21. The researchers suggested that each woman track the length of her cycle, which in the general population of women actually runs 19 - 60 days. A long cycle, for example, suggests a delayed ovulation date.
• Immediately after ovulation, the body temperature increases sharply in about 80% of cases. (Some women can be ovulating normally yet not show this temperature pattern.)