Our Work

Health Impact

  1. Home
  2. Our Work
  3. Healthy Lives
  4. Reproductive Health

Reproductive Health

In over 30 countries throughout the world PSI empowers women and couples to lead healthier lives by providing access to innovative family planning and maternal health products and services. Every year, there are more than 70 million unintended pregnancies and more than 340,000 women die from pregnancy-related causes.

In 2009 alone, PSI prevented an estimated 3.5 million unintended pregnancies and over 17,000 maternal deaths, and enabled millions of couples to plan their families.

Over the past three decades, PSI has expanded the contraceptive methods in its portfolio from male condoms and oral contraceptives to include injectable contraceptives, intrauterine contraceptive devices (IUD), emergency contraception pills, implants, female condoms, voluntary sterilization, and fertility awareness methods such as the Standard Days Method using Cyclebeads®. PSI’s RH platform has also grown to address maternal mortality through the prevention of post-partum hemorrhage and sepsis, and the prevention of unsafe abortion.

PSI employs innovative approaches to overcome significant consumer and provider-driven barriers to contraceptive use, and adapts its programs to the socio-cultural and economic environment of the target population.

The Reproductive Health Department’s mission is to maximize PSI’s impact on increasing contraceptive prevalence rates and decreasing maternal mortality ratios, in line with international standards and national priorities.

Read More

Meeting Unmet Need for Family Planning

More than 200 million women in the developing world have an unmet need for family planning, yet do not have access to modern contraceptives. Providing access to family planning prevents unintended, often high-risk pregnancies - those that come too early, too often or too late in life – and reduces the number of abortions, saving women's lives.

Benefits of family planning extend beyond a woman’s improved health. Spaced births and fewer pregnancies improve child survival. Women also have greater access to education and employment opportunities when they control their fertility, which can enhance their own and their families’ economic status.

By expanding access, ensuring affordability, and overcoming barriers, PSI is empowering women and couples to choose when and how many children they will have in their lifetime. Meeting this need is a critical part of improving the health and well being of women, families and communities.

Short-term Contraceptives
PSI socially markets the following short-term contraceptives:

Long-Acting and Permanent Methods
PSI promotes long-acting reversible contraception (LARC) and permanent methods by training providers, assuring quality of care, and social marketing.

Improving Maternal Health

Women worldwide continue to die from pregnancy-related causes at a rate of one woman per minute. The vast majority of these preventable deaths occur in developing countries where the lifetime risk of dying during pregnancy or childbirth is 1 in 75, compared to 1 in 7,300 in industrialized countries. An estimated 342,000 worldwide maternal deaths occur annually, and an additional 10 million women suffer lifelong disabilities due to pregnancy-related causes.

PSI works to prevent maternal injury and death by ensuring that women and birth attendants have access to low-cost, low-tech interventions, such as misoprostol to reduce Post-Partum Hemorrhage (PPH) and approved medical abortion drugs to prevent unsafe abortion.