CONTRACEPTION & FAMILY PLANNING | Mass. High School Clinic Officials Resign, Cite Lack of Support for Contraception Program
[May 28, 2008]

Two officials with the student health clinic at Gloucester High School in Massachusetts resigned Friday after an official at Addison Gilbert Hospital said the hospital would not support a proposal to make contraceptives available at the school's clinic, the Gloucester Daily Times reports. The hospital administers the student clinic with a grant from the state. Brian Orr, the clinic's medical director, and Kim Daly, primary nurse practitioner at the clinic, told hospital officials that their resignations follow the hospital's lack of support in recommending that confidential contraceptive services be available at the clinic. Daly was motivated by the spike in teen pregnancies at the school. She noted that 17 students at the school currently are pregnant, compared with four or five in a typical year, as well as the high number of pregnancy tests the clinic has conducted -- 150 since September 2007.

According to the Daily Times, the advisory committee for the student health clinic -- which includes representatives from the school, Cape Ann Pediatricians, the Gloucester Department of Public Health and the hospital -- began preparing a proposal for the School Committee to make contraception available in January. Gloucester Superintendent of Schools Christopher Farmer said the school district had been working with the Student Health Center Advisory Board to develop a contraception program to address an increase in pregnancies among students. The hospital's Executive Director Cindy Donaldson said, "When the issue came up of confidential contraception around February, we said, 'yikes.'" She added that the hospital had concerns regarding liability if a student experienced side effects from hormonal contraception, the community's reaction to the proposed program and whether the community wanted such a program.

According to the clinic's medical director, about 25% of the 50 school health clinics in Massachusetts offer confidential contraception to students. In order to receive services, parents must enroll their children in school-based clinics and provide health insurance information, according to the Daily Times. Nearly 95% of Gloucester's students are enrolled in the clinic. School Superintendent Christopher Farmer said the opinion of the hospital "flies in the face of the views and experience of the medical profession," adding that the hospital's concerns about liability have not appeared to have been a "cause for concern elsewhere."

Farmer said that if the "hospital's position is non-negotiable," the school district "will seek to open up an alternative route for the state funding to the health center." Donaldson said she was "surprised to hear of the resignations." She added that if the community demonstrated support for the proposed program, the hospital would bring the issue to the board of Northeast Health System, which operates the hospital (McCarthy, Gloucester Daily Times, 5/26).





The information contained in this publication reflects media coverage of women’s health issues and does not necessarily reflect the views of the National Partnership for Women & Families.

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