to think all teenage girls should be given a financial incentive to use LARC

[twentypoundsover]

as the cost to the taxpayer of say £500 for every year they didn't get pregnant would be dwarfed by the social and economic cost for paying for the consequences of teenage pregnancy.

'The implanon has such a low dose hormone that common practice is to go back on cocp for 6 months until side effects settle down, perfectly safe and the combination of progesterone would still be less than something like a depot or cerazette all it means is that your having oestrogen which plenty of women have in the pill all the time.'

Brought to you by the same people who tell anyone suffering with adverse side effects from the Mirena coil that it can't possibly be from the Mirena, it's so low-dose, right, that it'll settle, give it a few more months (on top of the 6+ months or years you may have spent suffering) etc etc.

I don't buy the 'it's totally safe' when it comes to pumping artificial hormones in children. Or that, if you're having side effects from hormonal contraception, the solution is to put more artificial hormones in, especially when it comes to a 14-year-old.

Exactly, Lynette!

Thats ok Lynette, you'll see i'm not up for financial incentives for Larcs for kids from my posts.

Lachesis, i would prefer not to have to give anyone hormones either if there was a better more reliable method then i would use that but there isn't i would rather go down this route with my dd than have her become a teenage mum, having had one myself or a termination at such a young age. I spend alot of time at work dealing with girls who require terminations for whatever reason and so yes this would be my choice. I find your attitude towards my comments rather ridiculous to be honest are all those FFS really necessary, what we are looking for is the best out come for these girls and until someone comes up with the perfect solution then we are working with the best we have, gold standard for me would be condoms plus another form of contraception but as i spend all day banging on about this and still get the same girls back pregnant or with STIs the fact remains they don't do it. Mirenas and implants are fine for lots of people and its only a very small number that decide they would prefer to have the pill as well to control bleeding patterns, again there choice, nobody is making you have it and perhaps an accidental pregnancy isn't so catastrophic for you as it is for some of my patients, so whichever method you choose is fine.

'what we are looking for is the best out come for these girls and until someone comes up with the perfect solution then we are working with the best we have, '

And I find you patronising and preachy. 'These girls'. All this 'we'. Speak for yourself! Let's start with the boys, before we go pumping girls full of articial hormones as a solution or an 'oh, well, this is the best we can come up with'.

Yep, 'only a very small number' have side effects. This is something trotted out a lot, too. Then you do research and find out it's more like 15-20% of users, hardly a 'very small number'.

I showed quite a lot of this thread to my 15 year old DD. She would like it known that she is 'not a bloody social experiment'.

Ah, I taught her well.

So what is your suggestion Lachesis, after all I am talking about my DD which as someone else picked up was very tongue in cheek. I dont tie my patients down and force them to be pumped full of chemicals and am always very honest about side effects but I do have to work with in the limittaions available to me. Are you implying we should get rid of the hormonal contraceptives? After all the new generation methods such as implanon and mirena contain much lower dose hormones than the older COCPs, that is not me making that up that is fact and it isn't some drug company myth.

When the boys came to me for contraceptive methods i discuss the best methods available to them too. Can you explain to me what you think i should be doing so differently seeing as you have taken such offense to what i said. I find your opinions very frightening given that you say you teach sexual health, surely in this role we should give out impartial advice. I have said what i would do with MY dd, not all of my patients and very rarely encourage the girls i see towards a Larc if they are reliable pill takers and this method suits them.

The "we" I talk about is society, there aren't many male contraceptive choices, it is not my job to debate why but for society to speak up if this is something that would be preferred, although that said i think that as it is young girls that often have to deal single handed with unwanted pregnancy that most of them feel more empowered to take responsibility for contraception rather than rely on males.

I'm not entirely sure what I have said that has offended you so much on a personal level but i do think its a shame we can't have a grown up debate without it being so nasty.

I think just need doctors to push these methods more and explain that actually the contraceptive pill is a bad choice for teenagers as it requires compliance (ie to remember) and doesn't protect against STD.

Condoms also require compliance but at least protect again STD.

And LARC doesn't require compliance but doesn't protect. I don't think there should be financial incentive on anyone other than perhaps the doctors, they get incentives for getting babies immunised or woman having smear tests so it could be the same for teenagers on LARC.

"no make it less attractive to have a baby"

^^ this.

'Are you implying we should get rid of the hormonal contraceptives? '

Get rea and stop putting words in my mouth and jumping to ridiculous conclusions. It's a good idea, too, to stop taking things so personally and assuming anyone who disagrees with you is offended - don't flatter yourself, it's an open internet forum with hundreds of thousands of members.

As for what I suggest, I'm more of the make it less attractive to have a baby train of thought. I don't think it's a good idea to offer money to young girls to use LARC.

'Can you explain to me what you think i should be doing so differently seeing as you have taken such offense to what i said. I find your opinions very frightening given that you say you teach sexual health, surely in this role we should give out impartial advice.'

You really seem to have an inflated sense of your own importance, you're a sex health counsellor, not an elected official charged with policy-making. I taught sexual health many years ago at a university in another country.

The thread is about 'Do you think it's reasonable to think all teenage girls should be given financial assistance to use LARC?' not 'Let's talk about magicmelons and make it all about her.'

And in response, I think yes, the OP is being U because I completely disagree with offering money to young girls to use LARC.

I can't be arsed to engage with posters who try to make it all about themselves and turn threads into personal chat discussions, either, so thenceforth, I'm going to use my imaginary iggy button because I honestly couldn't care less about what you do for a living.

Oh good, although just to things before you go 1) you picked out my post and chose to slate it after all it was just my opinion and 2) I am not a sexual health Counsellor .

oh and the only reason i mentioned my job is to back up that i have an opinion based on some knowledge, wasn't mentioned in my first post.

YABU. The vast majority of teenage girls are sensible enough to avoid pregnancy. Most are clued up enough to go for the MAP if they have an 'accident' or 'get carried away'. Pumping kids full of unnecessary contraceptive drugs for years is pointless overkill. Might be better money spent if silly little lads got educated on keeping their cocks in their pants or rubbered up at the very least.

The fact that, in this country, men can father multiple children and leave the cost of bringing them up almost entirely to the state (or women can produce as much children as they like and leave the cost of bringing them up entirely to the state as well), is something that needs to be rectified, too, when it comes to people being irresponsible or very lax about birth control.

If they knew they couldn't spunk and run they might think a bit more about using a condom.

Oh, yes, because what teenage girls really need is another social pressure telling them everyone expects them to be having sex.

Are you crazy?