A new family planning client has a contraceptive method in mind, and you need to make sure she is medically eligible to start her chosen method. A woman with HIV is pregnant and wants to know if she can breastfeed her baby safely after she delivers. You need more information about how to manage the third stage of labor to prevent postpartum hemorrhage, a leading cause of maternal deaths in your country.

As a health care provider working in the field, you need timely access to the latest scientific evidence and guidance in order to save people’s lives and improve their health, yet this information needs to be presented in a practical way that is easy to digest and use.  Your clients and patients are depending on you, and the time you have to spend searching for the best evidence is limited.

K4Health can help you find the information you need in family planning/reproductive health and related health topics.

• Deliver contraceptive methods appropriately and effectively. Our seminal handbook, Family Planning: A Global Handbook for Providers, offers guidance on 20 contraceptive methods and addresses many of your information needs, from contraceptive effectiveness and mechanisms of action to correcting misunderstandings and managing side effects. The book is available in English and in seven other languages (Arabic, French, Hindi, Persian, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, and Spanish). The companion wall charts, Do You Know Your Family Planning Choices? and Key Reminders About Hormonal Family Planning Methods, provide important but hard-to-remember details on one sheet.
• Determine medical eligibility for contraceptive use. Download our free interactive mobile application for Android phones, ACE (Application for Contraceptive Eligibility). ACE reflects the latest family planning guidance from the World Health Organization’s Medical Eligibility Criteria for Contraceptive Use. Health care workers can use ACE to check whether the client is medically eligible to use her preferred method by answering a series of questions about known medical conditions.
• Find research summaries, global technical guidance, job aids, and more. Explore one of 50 Toolkits, or electronic libraries of expert-vetted resources, on a range of topics—from contraceptive methods and mHealth to HIV/AIDS and gender. Download full-text versions of most of the resources, some of which are available in a number of languages, such as English, French, and Spanish.
• Learn about new topics or update your existing knowledge at your own pace. You can take eLearning courses from any location on a number of health topics, including maternal and child health, infectious diseases, gender, health systems, family planning/reproductive health, and HIV/AIDS. The courses can help you meet your continuing education requirements, keep up with advances in the public health field, and learn how to apply evidence-based information in real-life situations.
• Connect with other health care professionals to share experiences and lessons learned. Participate in a Community of Practice or eForum.
• Stay in touch with current news and events around the world. The K4Health Blog covers current news and events in the global public health field, including a special series on health innovations in global health technologies and advances and on women’s empowerment.
• Find answers to your research and programmatic questions. POPLINE, the largest database of population, family planning, and reproductive health literature, includes citations with abstracts to more than 350,000 scientific articles, reports, books, and unpublished materials.
• Request free images to use in your nonprofit information products. The Photoshare collection contains more than 17,000 images related to global health, which you can use for free in your information products, such as PowerPoint presentations, other electronic resources, or print materials.