4 Great Benefits of a Birth Control Implant

The CDC and other world health organizations all point to family planning as one of the biggest public health achievements of the 20th century, right up there with the seatbelt and vaccines. This explains why, in this century, nearly 65% of women of reproductive age in the United States use birth control.

One of the things that makes family planning so effective today is also its biggest challenge — there’s no shortage of birth control options, which can make choosing the right one tricky.

To help, the in-depth team of healthcare providers at Michigan Avenue Primary Care, which includes family planning specialists, wants to highlight one popular option here — the Nexplanon® birth control implant.

Let’s look at some of the many benefits of this approach to family planning.

1. The birth control implant is reliable

The first thing you want in a birth control is for it to do its job well in preventing an unplanned pregnancy. Well, the birth control implant excels in this arena and provides a near-perfect 99.9% efficacy rating.

The implant works to prevent pregnancy by slowly releasing progestin into your system that:

• Thickens the mucus around your cervix to prevent sperm from passing through
• Prevents ovulation

So, in effect, the implant offers double protection against pregnancy.

2. The implant is easy to use

The birth control implant is incredibly easy to use because there’s nothing you really have to do on your end, other than come to our office for a quick implantation visit. During this visit, we insert the tiny rod just below the surface of your skin in your upper arm. 

And that’s it. Once in place, the Nexplanon implant takes care of the rest.

3. The implant provides long-term protection

Not only is the birth control implant easy to use, it also offers long-term protection against pregnancy — 3 years! After 3 years, if you want to continue this form of birth control, you simply return to us for a new implant.

4. The implant is easily reversed 

The birth control implant is part of a larger group of birth control options called long-acting, reversible contraceptives. What this means is that, if at any point during your use of the implant you want to re-establish your fertility, all you have to do is see us to have us remove the implant.

Once we remove the implant, your fertility should come back online, barring any other issues that are unrelated to the birth control.

As you can see, there’s a lot to appreciate about the birth control implant. If you would like to learn more or schedule an appointment with one of our family planning experts, please contact us at our Chicago, Illinois, clinic, located in The Loop. You can also visit our urgent care center during operating hours, Monday through Friday, 8 am to 4 pm.