Leigh Senderowicz
Biographic Data
| ID | 255234 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Leigh Senderowicz |
| GIVEN NAMES | Leigh |
| FAMILY NAME | Senderowicz |
| SIGNATURE | SENDEROWICZ L |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Wisconsin–Madison |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-6713-1473 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 26 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 189 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 26 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2014 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 6 |
Brakes and accelerators to abortion access in a post-Dobbs landscape
It is critical to conduct research with people who consider abortion but never connect with a clinic, whose stories may help identify the largest impediments to abortion access. The need for this evidence is urgent in post- Dobbs restrictive states, including Wisconsin. We 1) located abortion considerers through innovative recruitment mechanisms, 2) examined their experiences within a dynamic state-based context, and 3) adapted a brakes-and-accel…
Postpartum Intrauterine Device Removal and Access to Removal in the 18 Months Following an Intervention in Tanzania, Sri Lanka, and Nepal
Family planning programs in the Global South promote long‐acting reversible contraception (LARC), but research suggests that women face barriers to LARC discontinuation, inhibiting their reproductive autonomy. Scholars have called for improved data visibility around LARC removal access. We use data from the Postpartum Intrauterine Device (PPIUD) Study, a randomized trial of a PPIUD intervention conducted in Nepal, Sri Lanka, and Tanzania from 201…
Barriers to contraceptive implant removal among current and prior implant users in Kisumu, Kenya
There has been increased promotion of long-acting reversible contraception (LARC) in the Global South in recent years. Studies have documented that women face barriers to removal when they desire to discontinue their LARC method, though few have quantified how often such experiences occur. We estimated the proportion of current and prior implant users who experienced or anticipated challenges with method removal using secondary data from a popula…
Keeping the “R” in Larc (long-acting reversible contraception)
As the use of subdermal contraceptive implants increases across sub-Saharan Africa, the need for person-centered removal services is more critical than ever to safeguard reproductive autonomy. In 2016, Christofield and Lacoste proposed eight conditions for client-centered implant removal, yet the extent to which these conditions have been assessed in large-scale surveys remains unexamined. Our mapping exercise collates survey information from thr…
A Measure Aligned With Reproductive Justice, Human Rights, and Sexual Well-Being…? Yes Please, and Here’s Why
Global Reproductive Justice
This special issue focuses on reproductive justice (RJ) as a framework for feminist research and activism. The introduction provides an overview of when and why the RJ framework was developed, outlines the ways it challenged and extended the way reproductive rights were understood and approached by feminist scholars and activists, and articulaties its productive potential. RJ’s relevance for identifying and responding to the breadth of rights vio…
Measuring Informed Choice for Contraception in Burkina Faso
Contraceptive Use and Discontinuation Among Adolescent Women in 55 Low- and Middle-Income Countries
Adolescent women aged 19 or younger make up a substantial and growing proportion of women of reproductive age in low- and middle-income countries. Several key features of the reproductive life course ground the need to disaggregate the contraceptive behaviors of adolescent women from those of older women, including relationship dynamics, resources and autonomy, and cultural and societal expectations regarding sexual activity and childbearing. Des…
Fertility Has Been Framed
High fertility and population growth have been framed as villains in global health and development. Inspired by neo-Malthusian concerns around resource depletion, scholars have argued that fertility reduction through increased contraceptive use is necessary to protect maternal health, prevent environmental disaster, and promote economic prosperity throughout the Global South. Despite substantial critique from feminist and anticolonial scholars, t…
Thirty years of 'strange bedmates
Widely credited with ending population control and ushering in a new era of reproductive rights, the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) Programme of Action also included some important compromises. The commemoration of ICPD+30 presents an opportune moment to reflect critically on those compromises and their implications for family planning programmes in the three decades since. Here, we critically examine how these…
Authors’ Response to “‘Supply‐Side Versus Demand‐Side Unmet Need
The effect of a postpartum intrauterine device programme on choice of contraceptive method in Tanzania
Vertical global health programmes often evaluate success with a narrow focus on programmatic outcomes. However, evaluation of broader patient-centred and unintended outcomes is critical to assess impacts on patient choice and autonomy. Here, we evaluate the effects of a postpartum intrauterine device (PPIUD) intervention on outcomes related to contraceptive method choice. The stepped-wedge cluster randomized contolled trial (RCT) took place in fi…
Assessing the Suitability of Unmet Need as a Proxy for Access to Contraception and Desire to Use It
Unmet need for contraception is a widely used but frequently misunderstood indicator. Although calculated from measures of pregnancy intention and current contraceptive use, unmet need is commonly used as a proxy measure for (1) lack of access to contraception and (2) desire to use it. Using data from a survey in Burkina Faso, we examine the extent to which unmet need corresponds with and diverges from these two concepts, calculating sensitivity,…
Measuring Contraceptive Autonomy at Two Sites in Burkina Faso
There is growing consensus in the family planning community around the need for novel measures of autonomy. Existing literature highlights the tension between efforts to pursue contraceptive targets and maximize uptake on the one hand, and efforts to promote quality, person‐centeredness, and contraceptive autonomy on the other hand. Here, we pilot a novel measure of contraceptive autonomy, measuring it at two Health and Demographic Surveillance S…
“She told me no, that you cannot change”
Enthusiasm for long-acting reversible contraception (LARC) is growing among donors and NGOs throughout the global reproductive health field. There is an emerging concern, however, that the push to insert these methods has not been accompanied by a commensurate push for access to method removal. We use data from 17 focus group discussions with women of reproductive age in an anonymized African setting to understand how users approach providers to …
Provider verbal disrespect in the provision of family planning in public-sector facilities in Western Kenya
Public-sector healthcare providers in low- and middle-income countries are a primary source of family planning but their disrespectful (i.e., demeaning or insulting) treatment of family planning clients may impede free contraceptive choice. The construct of disrespect and abuse has been widely applied to similar phenomena in maternity care and could help to better understand provider mistreatment of family planning clients. With a focus on public…
Evaluating the feasibility of the Community Score Card and subsequent contraceptive behavior in Kisumu, Kenya
Successful and impactful implementation of the CSC in the Kenyan context requires intensive community and provider sensitization, and pandemic conditions may have muted the impact on contraceptive uptake in this small pilot effort. Further investigation is needed to understand whether the CSC - or other social accountability efforts - can result in improved contraceptive access
Sex, poverty, and public health
Financial scarcity appears to constrain sexual wellbeing. To support positive sexual health, the public health field must continue to focus on economic reform, poverty reduction, and dismantling of structural classism as critical aspects of helping people achieve their full health and wellbeing potential. ClinialTrials.gov Identifier: NCT02734199
Supply-Side Versus Demand-Side Unmet Need
Despite its central importance to global family planning, the "unmet need for contraception" metric is frequently misinterpreted. Often conflated with a lack of access, misinterpretation of what unmet need means and how it is measured has important implications for family planning programs. We review previous examinations of unmet need, with a focus on the roles of access and demand for contraception, as well as the role of population control in …
‘I haven’t heard much about other methods’
BACKGROUND: Programmes promoting the postpartum intrauterine device (PPIUD) have proliferated throughout South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa in recent years, with proponents touting this long-acting reversible contraceptive (LARC) method's high efficacy and potential to meet contraceptive unmet need. While critiques of LARC-first programming abound in the Global North, there have been few studies of the impact of LARC-centric programmes on patient-…
Reproductive Autonomy Is Nonnegotiable, Even in the Time of Covid ‐19
The COVID-19 pandemic has swept across the world, altering nearly every facet of contemporary life and causing behavioral and socioeconomic changes that seemed unthinkable a few months ago. The increased risks for human health include not just the dangers posed by the virus itself, but also the upheaval to the broader health care and societal landscapes, which has threatened access to critical sexual and reproductive health services. In this view…
Contraceptive Autonomy
Since the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development, there has been increased attention to high‐quality and rights‐based family planning, but these concepts have been difficult to measure. Perhaps due to an intellectual history intertwined with population control, contemporary family planning programs and researchers often use (modern) method use as a primary marker of success, with indicators focusing narrowly on contraceptive …
Women's Perspectives on Postpartum Intrauterine Devices in Tanzania
Despite the numerous benefits of the postpartum copper intrauterine device (PPIUD), which is inserted within 48 hours after giving birth, it is underutilized in many resource‐constrained settings, including Tanzania. We conducted in‐depth interviews with 20 pregnant women who received contraceptive counseling during routine antenatal care in 2016–2017 and 27 postpartum women who had a PPIUD inserted in 2018 to understand reasons for use versus no…
I was obligated to accept
Education, Place of Residence and Utilization of Legal Abortion Services in Mexico City, 2013–2015
CONTEXT: Although abortion is illegal in most of Mexico, it was decriminalized in Mexico City in 2007, creating an island of legal abortion in a sea of restricted access. The characteristics of women seeking abortions in Mexico City-notably their socioeconomic status and place of residence-have not been well documented. METHODS: Medical records from 22,732 women who sought abortions at one of four primary-level clinics in Mexico City in 2013-2015…
I was obligated to accept
Contraceptive Autonomy
Since the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development, there has been increased attention to high‐quality and rights‐based family planning, but these concepts have been difficult to measure. Perhaps due to an intellectual history intertwined with population control, contemporary family planning programs and researchers often use (modern) method use as a primary marker of success, with indicators focusing narrowly on contraceptive …
Supply-Side Versus Demand-Side Unmet Need
Despite its central importance to global family planning, the "unmet need for contraception" metric is frequently misinterpreted. Often conflated with a lack of access, misinterpretation of what unmet need means and how it is measured has important implications for family planning programs. We review previous examinations of unmet need, with a focus on the roles of access and demand for contraception, as well as the role of population control in …
Measuring Contraceptive Autonomy at Two Sites in Burkina Faso
There is growing consensus in the family planning community around the need for novel measures of autonomy. Existing literature highlights the tension between efforts to pursue contraceptive targets and maximize uptake on the one hand, and efforts to promote quality, person‐centeredness, and contraceptive autonomy on the other hand. Here, we pilot a novel measure of contraceptive autonomy, measuring it at two Health and Demographic Surveillance S…
Do Natural Methods Count? Underreporting of Natural Contraception in Urban Burkina Faso
Natural methods of contraception were widely used in developed countries until the late 1960s to space and limit childbirth. In France, when the first contraceptive surveys were conducted, researchers noticed that the use of natural methods was underreported, and questions to correct for this bias were subsequently added. The Demographic and Health Surveys do not currently include questions specific to natural methods. We added such questions to …
Assessing the Suitability of Unmet Need as a Proxy for Access to Contraception and Desire to Use It
Unmet need for contraception is a widely used but frequently misunderstood indicator. Although calculated from measures of pregnancy intention and current contraceptive use, unmet need is commonly used as a proxy measure for (1) lack of access to contraception and (2) desire to use it. Using data from a survey in Burkina Faso, we examine the extent to which unmet need corresponds with and diverges from these two concepts, calculating sensitivity,…
Fertility Has Been Framed
High fertility and population growth have been framed as villains in global health and development. Inspired by neo-Malthusian concerns around resource depletion, scholars have argued that fertility reduction through increased contraceptive use is necessary to protect maternal health, prevent environmental disaster, and promote economic prosperity throughout the Global South. Despite substantial critique from feminist and anticolonial scholars, t…
Thirty years of 'strange bedmates
Widely credited with ending population control and ushering in a new era of reproductive rights, the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) Programme of Action also included some important compromises. The commemoration of ICPD+30 presents an opportune moment to reflect critically on those compromises and their implications for family planning programmes in the three decades since. Here, we critically examine how these…
Sex, poverty, and public health
Financial scarcity appears to constrain sexual wellbeing. To support positive sexual health, the public health field must continue to focus on economic reform, poverty reduction, and dismantling of structural classism as critical aspects of helping people achieve their full health and wellbeing potential. ClinialTrials.gov Identifier: NCT02734199
Reproductive Autonomy Is Nonnegotiable, Even in the Time of Covid ‐19
The COVID-19 pandemic has swept across the world, altering nearly every facet of contemporary life and causing behavioral and socioeconomic changes that seemed unthinkable a few months ago. The increased risks for human health include not just the dangers posed by the virus itself, but also the upheaval to the broader health care and societal landscapes, which has threatened access to critical sexual and reproductive health services. In this view…
Women's Perspectives on Postpartum Intrauterine Devices in Tanzania
Despite the numerous benefits of the postpartum copper intrauterine device (PPIUD), which is inserted within 48 hours after giving birth, it is underutilized in many resource‐constrained settings, including Tanzania. We conducted in‐depth interviews with 20 pregnant women who received contraceptive counseling during routine antenatal care in 2016–2017 and 27 postpartum women who had a PPIUD inserted in 2018 to understand reasons for use versus no…
Do Natural Methods Count? Underreporting of Natural Contraception in Urban Burkina Faso
Natural methods of contraception were widely used in developed countries until the late 1960s to space and limit childbirth. In France, when the first contraceptive surveys were conducted, researchers noticed that the use of natural methods was underreported, and questions to correct for this bias were subsequently added. The Demographic and Health Surveys do not currently include questions specific to natural methods. We added such questions to …
Education, Place of Residence and Utilization of Legal Abortion Services in Mexico City, 2013–2015
CONTEXT: Although abortion is illegal in most of Mexico, it was decriminalized in Mexico City in 2007, creating an island of legal abortion in a sea of restricted access. The characteristics of women seeking abortions in Mexico City-notably their socioeconomic status and place of residence-have not been well documented. METHODS: Medical records from 22,732 women who sought abortions at one of four primary-level clinics in Mexico City in 2013-2015…
Women's Perspectives on Postpartum Intrauterine Devices in Tanzania
Despite the numerous benefits of the postpartum copper intrauterine device (PPIUD), which is inserted within 48 hours after giving birth, it is underutilized in many resource‐constrained settings, including Tanzania. We conducted in‐depth interviews with 20 pregnant women who received contraceptive counseling during routine antenatal care in 2016–2017 and 27 postpartum women who had a PPIUD inserted in 2018 to understand reasons for use versus no…
I was obligated to accept
Reproductive Autonomy Is Nonnegotiable, Even in the Time of Covid ‐19
The COVID-19 pandemic has swept across the world, altering nearly every facet of contemporary life and causing behavioral and socioeconomic changes that seemed unthinkable a few months ago. The increased risks for human health include not just the dangers posed by the virus itself, but also the upheaval to the broader health care and societal landscapes, which has threatened access to critical sexual and reproductive health services. In this view…
Contraceptive Autonomy
Since the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development, there has been increased attention to high‐quality and rights‐based family planning, but these concepts have been difficult to measure. Perhaps due to an intellectual history intertwined with population control, contemporary family planning programs and researchers often use (modern) method use as a primary marker of success, with indicators focusing narrowly on contraceptive …
‘I haven’t heard much about other methods’
BACKGROUND: Programmes promoting the postpartum intrauterine device (PPIUD) have proliferated throughout South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa in recent years, with proponents touting this long-acting reversible contraceptive (LARC) method's high efficacy and potential to meet contraceptive unmet need. While critiques of LARC-first programming abound in the Global North, there have been few studies of the impact of LARC-centric programmes on patient-…
“She told me no, that you cannot change”
Enthusiasm for long-acting reversible contraception (LARC) is growing among donors and NGOs throughout the global reproductive health field. There is an emerging concern, however, that the push to insert these methods has not been accompanied by a commensurate push for access to method removal. We use data from 17 focus group discussions with women of reproductive age in an anonymized African setting to understand how users approach providers to …
Provider verbal disrespect in the provision of family planning in public-sector facilities in Western Kenya
Public-sector healthcare providers in low- and middle-income countries are a primary source of family planning but their disrespectful (i.e., demeaning or insulting) treatment of family planning clients may impede free contraceptive choice. The construct of disrespect and abuse has been widely applied to similar phenomena in maternity care and could help to better understand provider mistreatment of family planning clients. With a focus on public…
Evaluating the feasibility of the Community Score Card and subsequent contraceptive behavior in Kisumu, Kenya
Successful and impactful implementation of the CSC in the Kenyan context requires intensive community and provider sensitization, and pandemic conditions may have muted the impact on contraceptive uptake in this small pilot effort. Further investigation is needed to understand whether the CSC - or other social accountability efforts - can result in improved contraceptive access
Sex, poverty, and public health
Financial scarcity appears to constrain sexual wellbeing. To support positive sexual health, the public health field must continue to focus on economic reform, poverty reduction, and dismantling of structural classism as critical aspects of helping people achieve their full health and wellbeing potential. ClinialTrials.gov Identifier: NCT02734199
Supply-Side Versus Demand-Side Unmet Need
Despite its central importance to global family planning, the "unmet need for contraception" metric is frequently misinterpreted. Often conflated with a lack of access, misinterpretation of what unmet need means and how it is measured has important implications for family planning programs. We review previous examinations of unmet need, with a focus on the roles of access and demand for contraception, as well as the role of population control in …
The effect of a postpartum intrauterine device programme on choice of contraceptive method in Tanzania
Vertical global health programmes often evaluate success with a narrow focus on programmatic outcomes. However, evaluation of broader patient-centred and unintended outcomes is critical to assess impacts on patient choice and autonomy. Here, we evaluate the effects of a postpartum intrauterine device (PPIUD) intervention on outcomes related to contraceptive method choice. The stepped-wedge cluster randomized contolled trial (RCT) took place in fi…
Assessing the Suitability of Unmet Need as a Proxy for Access to Contraception and Desire to Use It
Unmet need for contraception is a widely used but frequently misunderstood indicator. Although calculated from measures of pregnancy intention and current contraceptive use, unmet need is commonly used as a proxy measure for (1) lack of access to contraception and (2) desire to use it. Using data from a survey in Burkina Faso, we examine the extent to which unmet need corresponds with and diverges from these two concepts, calculating sensitivity,…
Measuring Contraceptive Autonomy at Two Sites in Burkina Faso
There is growing consensus in the family planning community around the need for novel measures of autonomy. Existing literature highlights the tension between efforts to pursue contraceptive targets and maximize uptake on the one hand, and efforts to promote quality, person‐centeredness, and contraceptive autonomy on the other hand. Here, we pilot a novel measure of contraceptive autonomy, measuring it at two Health and Demographic Surveillance S…
Authors’ Response to “‘Supply‐Side Versus Demand‐Side Unmet Need
Barriers to contraceptive implant removal among current and prior implant users in Kisumu, Kenya
There has been increased promotion of long-acting reversible contraception (LARC) in the Global South in recent years. Studies have documented that women face barriers to removal when they desire to discontinue their LARC method, though few have quantified how often such experiences occur. We estimated the proportion of current and prior implant users who experienced or anticipated challenges with method removal using secondary data from a popula…
Keeping the “R” in Larc (long-acting reversible contraception)
As the use of subdermal contraceptive implants increases across sub-Saharan Africa, the need for person-centered removal services is more critical than ever to safeguard reproductive autonomy. In 2016, Christofield and Lacoste proposed eight conditions for client-centered implant removal, yet the extent to which these conditions have been assessed in large-scale surveys remains unexamined. Our mapping exercise collates survey information from thr…
A Measure Aligned With Reproductive Justice, Human Rights, and Sexual Well-Being…? Yes Please, and Here’s Why
Global Reproductive Justice
This special issue focuses on reproductive justice (RJ) as a framework for feminist research and activism. The introduction provides an overview of when and why the RJ framework was developed, outlines the ways it challenged and extended the way reproductive rights were understood and approached by feminist scholars and activists, and articulaties its productive potential. RJ’s relevance for identifying and responding to the breadth of rights vio…
Measuring Informed Choice for Contraception in Burkina Faso
Contraceptive Use and Discontinuation Among Adolescent Women in 55 Low- and Middle-Income Countries
Adolescent women aged 19 or younger make up a substantial and growing proportion of women of reproductive age in low- and middle-income countries. Several key features of the reproductive life course ground the need to disaggregate the contraceptive behaviors of adolescent women from those of older women, including relationship dynamics, resources and autonomy, and cultural and societal expectations regarding sexual activity and childbearing. Des…
Fertility Has Been Framed
High fertility and population growth have been framed as villains in global health and development. Inspired by neo-Malthusian concerns around resource depletion, scholars have argued that fertility reduction through increased contraceptive use is necessary to protect maternal health, prevent environmental disaster, and promote economic prosperity throughout the Global South. Despite substantial critique from feminist and anticolonial scholars, t…
Thirty years of 'strange bedmates
Widely credited with ending population control and ushering in a new era of reproductive rights, the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) Programme of Action also included some important compromises. The commemoration of ICPD+30 presents an opportune moment to reflect critically on those compromises and their implications for family planning programmes in the three decades since. Here, we critically examine how these…
Brakes and accelerators to abortion access in a post-Dobbs landscape
It is critical to conduct research with people who consider abortion but never connect with a clinic, whose stories may help identify the largest impediments to abortion access. The need for this evidence is urgent in post- Dobbs restrictive states, including Wisconsin. We 1) located abortion considerers through innovative recruitment mechanisms, 2) examined their experiences within a dynamic state-based context, and 3) adapted a brakes-and-accel…
Reproductive Health and Contraception (22 works) · Population (19 works) · Global Maternal and Child Health (18 works) · Medicine (17 works) · Family planning (14 works) · Sociology (14 works) · Environmental health (13 works) · Demography (10 works) · Political science (10 works) · Economics (9 works)