Maternal and Child Health Library

This and past issues of the MCH Alert are available at http://www.mchlibrary.info/alert/archives.html.

May 23, 2008

1. UPDATED REPORT DESCRIBES PROGRAMS PROVEN TO AFFECT THE BEHAVIORS OR SEXUAL HEALTH OUTCOMES OF YOUNG PEOPLE

Science and Success: Sex Education and Other Programs That Work to Prevent Teen Pregnancy, HIV and Sexually Transmitted Infections identifies effective programs to help young people reduce their risk for pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections (STIs), including HIV. The second edition, recently published by Advocates for Youth, describes 26 programs that met rigorous criteria for inclusion and strongly affected the behaviors or sexual health outcomes of young people exposed to the program. Twenty-three of the programs include information about abstinence and contraception within the context of sexual health education. Of the three that do not include sexual health education, two are early childhood interventions, and one is a service-learning program. The programs and their evaluations are divided into three sections in the report. Section 1 describes programs designed for and evaluated in school settings, including some that are linked to reproductive health care. Section 2 describes programs implemented by community agencies outside the school or clinic environment. Section 3 describes clinic-based programs. A table summarizing programs’ settings as well as the grade range, locale, and populations served by each is included. The full report is available at http://www.advocatesforyouth.org/programsthatwork/toc.htm. An executive summary is also available at http://www.advocatesforyouth.org/publications/ScienceSuccessES.pdf.

• A single preconception dose of Tdap will prevent pertussis and reduce morbidity associated with pertussis and might prevent exposing to pertussis persons at increased risk for pertussis and its complications, including infants.
• When pregnant women who have not received Tdap have indications for tetanus or diphtheria booster protection (10 or more years since the most recent Td), ACIP recommends receipt of Td during pregnancy.
• In special situations in which a pregnant woman has increased risk for pertussis, health professionals may choose to administer Tdap instead of Td during pregnancy to add protection against pertussis, after discussing the theoretical benefits and risks for the woman, her fetus, and the pregnancy outcome with her before vaccination.
• Women who have not received a previous dose of Tdap can be advised that ACIP recommends Tdap postpartum before discharge from the hospital or birthing center to provide personal protection and reduce the risk for transmitting pertussis to their infants.

• More than 90% of the girls were age 12 or younger; 75.1% identified themselves as African American or black and 32.9% as Latino.
• Less than 1% of parents reported that girls had used alcohol, but 22.3% of girls said that they had had a drink once or more, and 8% said they had been drunk in the past year.
• Accounts of watching movies or television or listening to music that parents did not approve of were somewhat more consistent across generations, as were the percentages of girls reporting that they had hung out with girls their parents did not approve of.
• About 38% of the girls reported that they had hung out with boys and older boys that their parents did not approve of; by contrast, 17% of parents perceived that their daughter hung out with boys they did not approve of, and only 5.1% perceived that this was with boys at least 2 years older.
• Parents' underestimation of risk was positively correlated with daughters' reports of fewer rules, less parental oversight, less parent-child communication, and less disapproval of risk. Moreover, among girls engaged in the riskiest behaviors, parents who underestimated these risks rated themselves more favorably on parenting practices -- counter to their daughters' assessments.