TY - JOUR T1 - Defining counselling in contraceptive information and services: outcomes from an expert think tank JF - BMJ Sexual & Reproductive Health JO - BMJ Sex Reprod Health DO - 10.1136/bmjsrh-2021-201132 SP - bmjsrh-2021-201132 AU - Moazzam Ali AU - Nguyen Toan Tran Y1 - 2021/06/14 UR - http://jfprhc.bmj.com/content/early/2021/06/14/bmjsrh-2021-201132.abstract N2 - As a global public health good, contraception is a core component of the Sustainable Development Goal 3.7 (universal access to sexual and reproductive healthcare services, including family planning). Fundamentally, access to contraceptive information and services is a human right that advances other human right aspects. Quality contraceptive information and services reinforce people’s freedom to determine the number and spacing of their children and offer a range of potential benefits encompassing women’s empowerment, economic development, education and improved health outcomes, including maternal and child health. However, in low- and middle-income countries, around 218 million women of reproductive age still have an unmet need for contraception in 2019 – meeting this need could drop annually an estimated 111 to 35 million unintended pregnancies, 35 to 10 million unsafe abortions, and 299 000 maternal deaths to 113 000.1Many contraceptive users discontinue their methods or fail to use them optimally.2 3 Quality contraceptive counselling has the potential to play a key role in supporting individuals select a method that matches their needs and expectations, mitigate any side effects, continue their method, or turn to other options, thereby reducing the unmet need for contraception, among other factors.4 There is, however, no standard definition of contraceptive counselling, although the centrality of quality counselling is underscored in different frameworks and programmatic and … ER -