Services and Clinics

About Family Planning

• Mission
• Roles
• Priorities

Our Mission

The New Mexico Department of Health Family Planning Program promotes and provides comprehensive family planning services, including clinic-based services and community education and outreach, to promote health and reproductive responsibility. These family planning services aid individuals and families in making choices regarding the spacing and number of their children. Family planning is an integral component of the Department of Health's efforts to reduce teen pregnancy, prevent unintended pregnancies and STDs, reduce infant mortality and morbidity, and improve the health of women and men of all ages.

Our Roles

• Provide individuals with information and means to determine the number and spacing of their children.

• Provide community education about issues related to family planning and sexuality; with special emphasis on parent and youth serving agencies.

• Delay pregnancy beyond the teen years to improve the socio-economic status and health of both mothers and infants.

• Improve responsible behavior and decision-making by providing contraceptive or abstinence education and teaching refusal skills.

• Reduce the negative impact of unintended pregnancies on individuals, families and the community.

• Reduce low birth weight, infant and maternal diseases and mortality by reducing pregnancies in adolescents.

• Help women space their pregnancies and offer preconception information on nutrition, smoking cessation and health risk reduction.

Our Priorities

Title X Program Priorities - The following priorities represent the overarching goals for the Title X program.

• Assuring continued high quality clinical family planning and related preventative health services that will improve the overall health of individuals;
• Assuring access to a broad range of acceptable and effective family planning methods and related preventative health services that include natural family planning methods, infertility services, and services for adolescents; highly effective contraceptive methods; breast and cervical cancer screening and prevention that corresponds with nationally recognized standards of care; STD and HIV prevention education, counseling, and testing; extramarital abstinence education and counseling; and other preventative health services. The broad range of services does not include abortion as a method of family planning;
• Encouraging participation of families, parents, and/or other adults acting in the role of parents in the decision of minors to seek family planning services, including activities that promote positive family relationships;
• Improving the health of individuals and communities by partnering with community-based organizations (CBOs), faith-based organizations (FBOs), and other public health providers that work with vulnerable or at-risk populations;
• Promoting individual and community health by emphasizing clinical family planning and related preventative health services for hard-to-reach populations, such as uninsured or under-insured individuals, males, persons with limited English proficiency, adolescents, and other vulnerable or at-risk populations.

Legislative Mandates - The following legislative mandates have been part of the Title X appropriations for each of the last several years.

• "None of the funds appropriated in this Act may be made available to any entity under Title X of the Public Health Service Act unless the applicant for the award certifies to the Secretary that it encourages family participation in the decision of minors to seek family planning services and that it provides counseling to minors on how to resist attempts to coerce minors into engaging in sexual activities;" and
• "Notwithstanding any other provision of law, no provider of services under Title X of the Public Health Service Act shall be exempt from any State law requiring notification or the reporting of child abuse, child molestation, sexual abuse, rape, or incest."

Other Key Issues - In addition to the Program Priorities and Legislative Mandates, the following Key Issues have implications for the Title X services projects.

• The increasing cost of providing family planning services;
• The U.S. Department of Health and Human Service priorities, initiatives, and Healthy People 2010 objectives as they relate to family planning and reproductive health. (http://www.health.gov/healthypeople);
• Departmental initiatives and legislative mandates such as the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA); Infant Adoption Awareness Program; providing adolescents with information, skills and support to encourage delay of sexual activity; serving persons with limited English proficiency;
• Integration of HIV/AIDS services in Family Planning, specifically, HIV/AIDS education, counseling and testing either on-site or by referral should be provided in all Title X funded programs. Education regarding the prevention of HIV/AIDS should incorporate the "ABC" message. That is, for adolescents and unmarried individuals, the message is "A" for abstinence; for married or individuals in committed relationships, the message is "B" for being faithful; and, for individuals who engage in behavior that puts them at risk for HIV, the message is "C" for condom use.
• Utilization of electronic technologies such as e-Grants, the OPA electronic grants management system (training for grantees will be provided as needed);
• Data collection and reporting which is responsive to the Family Planning Annual Report (FPAR) and other information needs for monitoring and improving family planning services;
• Service delivery improvement through utilization of research outcomes focusing on family planning and related population issues;
• And, utilizing practice guidelines and recommendations developed by recognized professional organizations and other Federal agencies in the provision of evidence-based Title X clinical services.

revised 2007

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