The objective of the LARC Mentoring Program is to increase access to (IUDs and hormonal implants) for women of reproductive age in New Mexico. We do this by training primary care providers in LARC procedures and improving clinic flow, billing, and coding for more efficient patient care. Each participating clinic site engages in ongoing hands-on training and mentoring activities and uses the clinic support systems constructed by the University of New Mexico and LARC Mentoring Program for this initiative. In addition to addressing access to LARC in the outpatient setting, the initiative works with community hospitals to offer LARC to women immediately following birth (post-partum LARC) which is an effective method for increasing the time between births as well as reducing unintended pregnancy. Child health outcomes are greatly improved when a pregnancy is a planned and anticipated event and when children are born at least two years apart.
The LARC Mentoring Program is motivated to increase access to all forms of contraceptive including IUDs and implants for all patients across New Mexico. We aim to improve provider communication on contraceptive options in the context of comprehensive patient-centered counseling. Also, the LARC Mentoring program is constantly try to invent new ways to increase administrative knowledge and support for LARC implementation in New Mexico clinics. Since November of 2016 we have trained over 1,000 providers and are expanding yearly into rural and urban communities across the state. Our training and expertise has led to sucessfully educating practioners in New Mexico clinics by choosing the right birth control options for patients and providing quality health care in reproductive wellbeing across the state with our initiative.
