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. 1975;52(2):155-61.

Family planning for the mentally handicapped

H P David, M A Lindner

Family planning for the mentally handicapped

H P David et al. Bull World Health Organ. 1975.

Abstract

PIP: Although family planning services have grown throughout much of the world, organized efforts to incorporate voluntary fertility-regulating resources into specialized service programs for the mentally handicapped have been sparse. With the growing shift from custodial and segregative institutionalization of the mentally ill and the mentally retarded to early discharge and community maintenance, there are greater opportunities for heteroxexual relationships and a concomitant risk of unintended pregnancies. While the birth rate among Western societies has decreased since the introduction of modern methods of contraception, among the mentally handicapped, it has increased. A review of European and North American publications reflects an increasing awareness of the problem of providing family planning services to mentally ill and mentally retarded people in a more active manner. Mental health specialists and those who work with the handicapped must be made more familiar with the needs of their patients in regard to family planning and they must develop the sensitivity needed to help the mentally handicapped search for a resolution to their sexual problems.

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References

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