Use effectiveness of the Creighton model ovulation method of natural family planning

Abstract

Objective: To determine the use effectiveness of the Creighton model ovulation method in avoiding and achieving pregnancy.

Design: Prospective, descriptive.

Setting: A natural family planning clinic at a university nursing center.

Participants: Records and charts from 242 couples who were taught the Creighton model. The sample represented 1,793 months of use of the model.

Main outcome measure: Creighton model demographic forms and logbook.

Results: At 12 months of use, the Creighton model was 98.8% method effective and 98.0% use effective in avoiding pregnancy. It was 24.4% use effective in achieving pregnancy. The continuation rate for the sample at 12 months of use was 78.0%.

Conclusion: The Creighton model is an effective method of family planning when used to avoid or achieve pregnancy. However, its effectiveness depends on its being taught by qualified teachers. The effectiveness rate of the Creighton model is based on the assumption that if couples knowingly use the female partner's days of fertility for genital intercourse, they are using the method to achieve pregnancy.

PIP: In Wisconsin, nurse researchers followed 242 couples who had enrolled in the Marquette University Nursing Center's natural family planning program between October 1984 and May 1992 to determine the use effectiveness of the Creighton model ovulation detection method to avoid or achieve pregnancy. The couples were largely college educated (98%), white (93%), and Roman Catholic (80.2%). Natural family planning [NFP] practitioners trained according to the Creighton model use a standard teaching format and language to teach couples how to determine fertility by examining the cervical mucus. The practitioner informs each couple that if they choose to have genital intercourse during the fertile period, they have abandoned the model as a method of pregnancy avoidance and have adopted it as a method of achieving pregnancy. The NFP practitioners followed the couples for 12 months for a cumulative number of 2284 ordinal months, during which the couples used the Creighton model. The use effectiveness rate of avoiding pregnancy at the 12th ordinal month was 98%. The method effectiveness rate of avoiding pregnancy at the 12th ordinal month was 98.8%. The use effectiveness rate of achieving pregnancy at the 12th ordinal month was 24.4%. The cumulative discontinuation rate was 20.2% at the 12th ordinal month. Personal reasons (17.4%) were the major reason for discontinuation. These findings suggest that the Creighton model is effective at avoiding or achieving pregnancy, if it is taught by qualified teachers.