Using data to advance knowledge

Women in rural and regional areas have poorer access to primary care and poorer sexual and reproductive outcomes of poorer quality. This study will analyse data from the Australian Longitudinal Study of Women’s Health to examine fertility behaviours and access to sexual and reproductive health services in primary care across a national population sample of urban versus rural young adult women. This will include an analysis of the influence of socio-demographic characteristics on abortion incidence rates.

Young Australian women with chronic disease are more likely to use low efficacy contraception or no contraception at all compared to the general population. This project will examine the prevalence and incidence of abortion among young women with a range of chronic diseases that are associated with poor maternal and foetal outcomes.

Robust data on abortions are needed to tailor public health responses that include equitable access to contraception and abortion care. This study will examine the prevalence of a history of induced abortion among individuals giving birth in Victoria using perinatal data.

Unintended pregnancy is a population-level indicator of reproductive health. The ability to decide whether, when, and under what circumstances to have a child is globally recognised as a fundamental human right, and levels of unintended pregnancy provide one measure (albeit a blunt one) of gaps remaining towards its realisation.