THE IMPACT OF AN INCREASE IN FAMILY-PLANNING-SERVICES ON THE TEENAGE POPULATION OF PHILADELPHIA

In an assessment conducted 30 months after a Philadelphia-area project increased the resources that community family planning agencies devot ed to teenage services, teenagers in targeted communities showed no ge neralized improvement in rates of pregnancy and childbearing, in knowl edge or use of clinic services, or in attitudes toward contraception c ompared with those of teenagers in the entire city. Samples of adolesc ents aged 14-18 from the clinics' catchment areas and from the entire city were interviewed in mid-1988, when the project's activities began , and 2.5 years later. The results suggest that while community family planning clinics may provide effective services to the teenagers who seek them out, they may not be the most effective strategy for decreas ing rates of pregnancy and childbearing in the overall teenage populat ion.