Field Placement: The Center for Reproductive Health Research and Policy, UCSF
Location: San Francisco, CA
Preceptor: Julie Sakowski
Student Name: Talia Baruth
Year: 2003

The government is supposed to protect public safety, provide public services and assistance, make rules for the marketplace, and determine civil rights and criminal wrongs. However, it is complicated, controversial and ultimately confusing how these concepts relate to abortion and other reproductive health issues in the United States. I spent the summer with the Center for Reproductive Health Research and Policy at the University of California, San Francisco with the Advancing New Standards in Reproductive Health (ANSIRH) group working on ways to maintain and increase access to reproductive care. I spent half of my week working at the offices of this team, and the other half of the week with health economists who are part of this overall project to explore the economic questions relating to the project. At the two offices throughout the summer, I spent time on numerous research projects to promote increased access to reproductive health options for women. Although government policy is constantly wavering on reproductive health issues, and especially abortion, I found it vital to explore ways to increase choices for women.

The main goal of the projects I worked on was to explore reasons why implementation of medical abortion services and requests by patients have been well below initial estimates. During my internship I had did several projects to determine the impact of malpractice coverage, general costs, determination of costs, billing, and other potential barriers. To conduct the research I used PubMed using regular and MeSH searches, ASAP, ProQuest and JSTOR databases, in addition to online searches. From my findings I created several summaries of the present information, a basic literature review on the current cost data, background information sheets, and decision analysis trees using the software DATA. Through this work I helped to provide context, assisted in research study conceptualization and protocol design, and worked on data collection and analysis.

Toward the end of my summer, I worked on an update to a paper on emergency contraception for rape victims. Unfortunately thousands of women become pregnant each year as a result of rape and it can be assumed that most of the resulting pregnancies are unwanted. Although several states have mandated that emergency contraception be offered to rape victims since first publication, the situation is still far from ideal. It was very interesting to work on this project and expand my knowledge in the policy arena of reproductive health.

Working here introduced me to the highly controversial topic of abortion and forced me to learn more about the true politics of health policy. I look forward to using the knowledge I gained during these 12 weeks working with the ANSIRH group to work on further research, policy proposals and programs to increase options for women and the overall health of society.

Back to CHS Field Studies Placement Index | Back to CHS Field Studies | Back to Field Studies Home