Acceptability of adolescents undertaking contraceptive counselling with pharmacist

For adolescents, pharmacists have the potential to be an entry point to sexual and reproductive health services in the primary care system. Understanding the acceptability of pharmacists delivering contraceptive counseling is important to ensure that delivery of service by pharmacists meets the needs of adolescents. We will use qualitative methods to elicit the experiences of adolescents to ascertain how we can improve the service delivery and experience of adolescents accessing sexual and reproductive health care in the pharmacy setting. This project sits within a program of research being undertaken by Professor Mazza in SPHERE, a NHMRC-funded Centre of Research Excellence in Sexual and Reproductive Health for Women in Primary Care. This is the first dedicated Centre to lead research that is aimed at improving the quality, safety, and capacity of primary health care services to achieve better outcomes in women’s sexual and reproductive health. Students working under SPHERE will be supported by Professor Mazza's research team, which consists of PostDocs, PhD students, academic registrars, and honors students. They will also have the opportunity to be part of a large, multidisciplinary, collaborative team of investigators, which includes prominent national and international researchers and experts working in women’s health, general practice, pharmacy, nursing, epidemiology, knowledge translation, health economics, and policy development.