Description
During the COVID-19 pandemic, one in three women delayed contraceptive care or had difficulty obtaining contraception. To improve access, reimbursement and HIPAA policies were relaxed to facilitate implementation of telehealth services across the health care system nationally. Federally Qualified Health Centers (FQHCs) are part of the nation's health care safety-net and provide contraceptive care services to underserved patient populations. As such, it is important to study access to services at these clinics, particularly at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. This study aimed to examine telehealth service provision for contraceptive services at rural and urban FQHC clinics in South Carolina (SC) and Alabama (AL) before and during the initial months of the COVID-19 pandemic. Both SC and AL have large rural and low-income populations, which experience disproportionate barriers to contraceptive care, making telehealth particularly important for meeting their reproductive health needs.
Publication Date
4-7-2022
Recommended Citation
Center for Applied Reasearch and Evaluation in Women's Health, East Tennessee State University, "Telehealth for Contraceptive Counseling During the COVID-19 Pandemic Among Federally Qualified Health Centers" (2022). Center for Applied Research and Evaluation (CARE) in Women's Health Issue Briefs. 7.
https://dc.etsu.edu/care-womens-health-issue-briefs/7