Open AccessFamily planning in people with multiple sclerosis: a plain language summary
Author(s) -
Simona Bonavita,
Hilary Worton,
Dominic Jack
Publication year - 2022
Publication title -
neurodegenerative disease management
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 1758-2032
pISSN - 1758-2024
DOI - 10.2217/nmt-2021-0045
Subject(s) - family planning , quarter (canadian coin) , multiple sclerosis , fertility , family medicine , pregnancy , medicine , psychology , demography , gerontology , psychiatry , environmental health , geography , population , sociology , research methodology , archaeology , biology , genetics
This is a plain language summary of an article originally published in the journal Frontiers in Neurology. People with multiple sclerosis (often shortened to MS) may have concerns about pregnancy and fertility. To understand more about these concerns, 332 people with MS in the USA, UK, France, Germany, Italy, and Spain took a survey with questions about how they made family planning decisions.Most of the survey participants (around 82%) were women. The survey found that people with MS were less likely to have children than people without MS. Over half (56%) of people with MS said the disease impacted their family planning decisions in some way, almost one quarter (22%) significantly changed their plans for the timing of their pregnancy or number of children, and 14% decided against having children. For almost 4 out of 5 (81%) people with MS the main source of family planning information was healthcare professionals.Overall, MS significantly impacted patients' decisions about family planning.