Why FACTS?

because we recognized that there was a dearth of educational opportunities for physicians and students to learn about how natural methods work, how effective they can be for family planning and the positive impact they can have on women’s health. 

Where is FACTS?

Discuss where our work is happening in medical schools, residencies and now reaching out to other specialties and health professional area – nursing, mid-wfery.  Emphasize that this important information about fertility and family planning should be shared with all our health professional colleagues who care for women and men of reproductive age.

A brief history of the NFP movement and FACTS

In 1972, at the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development and the Human Life Foundation Conference, NFP experts from around the world developed a consensus definition of NFP:

“Natural family planning methods are means by which a couple uses the daily observations of signs and symptoms of the fertile and infertile phases of the menstrual cycle to guide the timing of intercourse according to their desire to achieve or avoid a pregnancy.”

In the 19^th century, significant scientific discoveries were made that contributed to the development of natural methods of family planning. However, it was in the late 1920s that two physician scientists discovered a key component that led to the first reliable method of natural birth regulation. Experiments by Dr. Kyusako Ogino from Japan and Dr. Herman Knaus from Austria determined that, once a woman ovulates, there will be approximately 12-14 days until her next menses. From this information (and knowing the approximate life span of the woman’s egg and man’s sperm), they independently developed formulas to estimate the fertile times in a woman’s menstrual cycle.

Over the past fifty years, significant innovations have been made in women’s health care, particularly within the realm of reproductive science. Parallel to these advances, natural methods for monitoring fertility have been standardized and refined. This has led to more effective tracking of a woman’s cycle and her times of fertility. This information can be used to help couples achieve or postpone pregnancy and, in many cases, to diagnose and address underlying gynecological problems. 

Modern evidence based methods of natural family planning including the Billings Method^TM, Creighton Model FertiliyCare™, Symptothermal Method, also referred to as STM or FAM (fertility awareness method), the Marquette Model, Two Day Method, Standard Days or Cycle Beads method, and the Lactation Amenorrhea Method (LAM).   For more information and patient education handouts about each of these methods, please go to:  http://www.factsaboutfertility.org/resources/overview/

Who is FACTS?

FACTS was founded in 2010 by two family physicians: Dr. Marguerite Duane and Dr. Bob Motley. Since then, more than 130 people have joined FACTS via the FMEC.  Healthcare professionals make up the majority of our group, including family physicians, obstetrician/gynecologists, pediatricians, midwives, nurses, nurse practitioners, residents, and students. We also have a number of researchers, natural family planning and fertility awareness educators, and women and men who use each of the various methods. We are a diverse group of individuals united by a common goal: to share the best evidence available with health care colleagues so they can educate women and men about their fertility, empower them to make more informed choices about family planning, and enable women to collaborate with their physicians to better monitor and manage their reproductive health.

We also have members who are women’s health advocates and promote these methods as a way to empower women, and other who offer these methods in faith based settings. We have members from Oregon to Arizona to Florida and New York with solid representation from the Midwest and Mid-Atlantic States. We are proud to have experts and/or leaders representing each of the evidence-based FABMs: Billings, Creighton, Sympto-Thermal, Marquette, Two Day, Standard Days, and the Lactation Amenorrhea Method.

To ensure our continued success, all members are expected to support our mission and vision and to abide by the Principles of Dialogue instrumental to fostering relationships and deeper understanding within groups and organizations. Our 5-member Executive Team, led by Dr. Duane and Dr. Motley, steers our work. Larry Bauer, CEO of the FMEC, serves as an ex officio member.

Here is a brief introduction to our Executive Team members:

Dr. Marguerite Duane, a family physician and FACTS co-founder, is trained as a Creighton Medical Consultant and TeenSTAR educator. She has a faculty appointment at Georgetown University, where she teaches a course on modern FABMs. She previously served on the board of the FMEC.

Dr. Robert Motley, a family physician and FACTS co-founder, is also a Creighton Medical Consultant. He is a member of the residency faculty at Lehigh Valley Health Network, where he also serves as President of the Medical Staff. He also works with a non-profit organization in his community that supports fertility care.  

Dr. Mike Manhart, Executive Director of the Couple to Couple League (CCL), joined the FACTS Executive Team in 2011. He has a doctorate in Microbiology and worked for Procter and Gamble in healthcare research and development. He and his wife have been volunteer teachers for CCL for over 25 years.

Ashley Stone, a medical student at the University of Texas Southwestern, serves as the student liaison to the FACTS Executive Team. She is the founder and President of the FACTS student group at UT Southwestern and is trained as a Billings instructor.

Dr. Amina White is an obstetrician-gynecologist and Creighton-trained medical consultant. She serves on the faculty at Howard University College of Medicine. She works at the National Institutes of Health in the Clinical Center Department of Bioethics, where she studies the ethical challenges physicians face when caring for vulnerable patient populations.

To learn more about our Executive Team, go to:  http://www.factsaboutfertility.org/about/executive-team/

What is FACTS?

Welcome to the FACTS blog! We are delighted you are interested in learning more, so “What is FACTS ?”

The Fertility Appreciation Collaborative is a group of physicians, health care professionals, and educators working together to Teach the Systems of natural or fertility awareness based methods of family planning,.  The term natural family planning or NFP may be more commonly used to refer to these available systems or methods of family planning but they are more accurately described as Fertility Awareness Based Methods (FABMs) , since a clear understanding of a woman’s fertility is central to their effectiveness and usefulness.

Our mission is to educate physicians and healthcare professionals using medical evidence so they may educate and empower women and engage men to appreciate and care for their fertility.

To help us achieve our mission, our goals are to:

1.      Educate physicians and healthcare professionals in the basic principles of fertility awareness based methods (FABMs) and the supporting science behind their medical applications. 

2.      Provide a forum for clinicians, educators, and researchers to share and expand the evolving body of evidence about FABMs.

3.      Promote FABMs and provide opportunities for learning more about them and their use in effective, relationship-centered care for women and couples.

4.   Foster respect and support for clinicians and students as collaborators in patient-centered reproductive health care.

Since FACTS was founded in 2010, we have made significant progress towards achieving our goals (thanks, in large part, to the more than 130 people who have supported our efforts). We invite you to follow our blog to learn more about FACTS – the who, what, when, where and why or better yet, visit our website and become a member at www.FACTSaboutFertility.org

Welcome to the FMEC FACTS Blog

The FMEC is a catalyst, convener  and incubator that supports the "bright ideas" of Family Physicians.

A few years ago, Marguerite Duane, MD, MHA, a former FMEC Board member, shared a bright idea. She believed that women and men were looking for natural methods to support their family planning. She had learned about fertility awareness based methods (FABM) of family planning. Her BHAG was to create an educational initiative that would inform students, residents, faculty and office based practitioners about FABMs.

The FACTS Initiative has attracted interest among a broad group of health care professionals.

This blog provides the leaders and members of the FACTS initiative with a venue for sharing their story.