It's a new month and you know what that means, right? New health observances. Yay!

Fibromyalgia Education and Awareness Month. National Arthritis Month. Lyme Disease Awareness Month. And let us not forget Food Allergy Awareness Week and National Brain Tumor Action Week. How come food allergies and brain tumors only get a week?

May is also, of course, Teen Pregnancy Prevention Month and May 6th is our very own National Day to Prevent Teen Pregnancy. Beginning today, we hope that teens, parents, teachers and anyone who cares about young people will get involved online. Throughout May, teens are encouraged to visit our teen website -- StayTeen.org -- to take our National Day Quiz, which challenges them to think about what they would do in different risky sexual situations. In addition to the quiz, we're also offering an online widget mini-quiz (you can grab it below) that stresses the importance of healthy relationships. Teens can add this quiz to their profiles on websites like MySpace and Facebook and enter a contest to win free plane tickets or a free iPod Touch. I'll bet you the Fibromyalgia people aren't giving away free iPods...

With so many different issues vying for attention during May, it can be so easy to just not do anything.  Don't just observe Teen Pregnancy Prevention Month.  Get active. Visit StayTeen.org and take the quiz yourself. Talk to every teen you know about pregnancy prevention and tell them to take the quiz and grab the widget. Tell them that we're giving away some cool stuff. 

For more information and to see what others around the country are doing to support the National Day, visit our National Day page the TheNationalCampaign.org.

The 2009 NFPRHA Conference wrapped up with several excellent workshops and presentations yesterday. In a particularly impassioned workshop presentation, Linda Dominguez reminded us that no decision is more important than helping a couple plan when they want to have children, and that making a contraceptive choice can be one of the most important decisions women (and their partners) make. She went on to point out that whatever kind of contraception that a woman chooses at a particular point in time should fit in with her reproductive life plan (do you have a reproductive life plan: how many kids do you want to have? When do you want to have them? With whom? Has a provider ever asked about your plan?).

The goal is to have women and men embrace their contraceptive method, and help them to be satisfied with the method they have selected (or help them find another method that might work better for them).

• How can we work to dispel the myths around contraceptive methods and talk more about the fantastic health benefits that are associated with some methods?

• More than one-third of women report that they are using a method of contraception that they don't like - how can we reach these women and help them find a method that they do like?

• The next question is, how can we help women and men use the method they have selected as effectively as possible?

A presentation by Hieke Thiel de Bocanegra of UCSF's Bixby Center for Global Reproductive Health offered one innovative way to tackle this second question. A pilot project she is leading (full disclosure: funded by the National Campaign) uses text messaging to remind women that it's time to fill their prescription (e.g., if on the NuvaRing) or visit the clinic for a follow-up appointment (e.g., if they need a Depo shot). The project aims include determining 1) the feasibility of this type of reminder system; 2) the acceptability and usage of this system by providers and clients; and 3) the system's effectiveness. More on this to come as the project progresses...

One hundred days into his administration and it is clear that President Obama is ready to take up the important issue of teen pregnancy prevention and unplanned pregnancy with a sense of urgency and seriousness that it deserves. Nothing exemplifies this more than what we heard at NFPRHA's annual gala luncheon yesterday when Melody Barnes, Director of the White House Domestic Policy Council, spoke about the need to direct more resources toward programs and services that support women's health and access to family planning services.

The Obama administration has made a strong commitment to prevention and evidence-based approaches to reduce teen and unintended pregnancy and in turn the need for abortion. In establishing the White House Council on Women and Girls, President Obama will address these issues and many others affecting women and women's health. In her remarks, Ms. Barnes expressed concern about the number of teens who are having sex without using contraception and acknowledged how important it is for parents to have the tools to be able to talk with their teens--both girls and boys. In addition, she raised the importance of involving young adults, men and women, in conversations about taking personal responsibility for their physical and emotional well-being.

To advance its goals, the White House is meeting with organizations and people in communities around the country and across the political spectrum to learn more about what communities are doing and what works. Ms. Barnes expressed a strong interest in working in partnership with family planning and reproductive health care providers to ensure that all women, men, and families get the health care and services they need.

This bodes well for those of us interested in making a serious dent in reducing the high rates of teen and unplanned pregnancy in our country. The steps the administration is taking are very encouraging and promising if we are to improve the lives and future prospects of children and families, and to help ensure that children are born into stable families who are ready for the demanding task of parenting.

The National Family Planning & Reproductive Health Association (NFPRHA) is holding their 2009 National Conference from April 26-29 (halfway over, in other words!) in Bethesda, MD, and we direct many thanks to NFPRHA for including us among the bloggers invited to attend the conference.

The theme of this year's conference is Empowering the Majority: Expanding Access to Family Planning, and based on the sessions I attended today, the title's a great fit. The sessions I sat in on spanned coalition advocacy, contraception, and outreach to hard-to-reach populations, and each delivered practical solutions for maximizing quality of and access to family planning services. A few highlights:

• Yamelsie Rodriguez, Regional Director of Clinical Operations for Planned Parenthood of Illinois shared some very basic but unfortunately not-always-obvious tips for providing family planning services to Latinos (eg. recruit Spanish-speaking volunteers to help with paperwork and provide appointment confirmation in Spanish).

• Nurse Practioner Susan Wysocki offered a fact and fiction information session on Intrauterine contraception (IUC) including tips for maximizing communication with patients.

• Jackie Kendall of Midwest Academy highlighted the distinction between strategy and tactics in coalition building and emphasized the importance of creating a strategy that builds upon the strengths of the organizations involved and incorporates a variety of tactics drawing upon those strengths.

For more information on the conference visit NFPRHA's website (click here to view the events schedule). You can also check out feministing.com's blog post on today's opening panel, or you can follow the conference on Twitter under the hashtag #nfprhacon.

Stay tuned...

I am coming up on the fifth anniversary of my employment with The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy next week. When I joined the Campaign, one of my first tasks was to take over our annual teen awareness event, The National Day to Prevent Teen Pregnancy. This year will be my fifth National Day - the Campaign's eighth - and I feel like this event just gets better every year.

One thing that continually amazes me about the National Day is the groundswell of support that the event receives in communities across the nation. The National Day simply could not be a success without the hard work of the many organizations and individuals who organize and participate in National Day activities.

Here are some of my favorite stories sent this year by National Day friends from around the country:

• In Hot Springs, Arkansas, the Smart Teens/Healthy Decisions Coalition is gearing up for National Day with a number of activities. They plan to offer the National Day Quiz to students at local middle school and high school campuses and they are holding a National Day poster design contest for students. In addition, they are planning an event at a local middle school campus where students will present dramatic skits about avoiding risky behavior and peer pressure. Other schools in the county are being sent invitations to participate and being offered a free National Day kit with fliers, wristbands, and a list of ideas and offer of guest speakers from the Coalition.

• In San Jacinto, California, Valley Wide Counseling, a Program of MFI Recovery, is planning their third annual community event in recognition of the National Day. They are hosting the Know Limits Teen Health Challenge at the Hemet Valley Mall. The event is set for this Saturday (May 2) from 12-4pm and more than 40 community agencies and schools, as well as government and local business, are planning to attend. Several performances have been scheduled by the local cheer/dance teams, a band, DJ, and VITAL (an intergenerational theatre troupe). They also plan to have activities such as a raffle, rock wall, and an information scavenger hunt.