Contraceptive efficacy, compliance and beyond: factors related to satisfaction with once-weekly transdermal compared with oral contraception.
OBJECTIVE
To investigate contraceptive efficacy, compliance and user's satisfaction with transdermal versus oral contraception (OC).


METHODS
Randomized, open-label, parallel-group trial conducted at 65 centers in Europe and South Africa. One thousand four hundred and eighty-nine women received a contraceptive patch (n = 846) or an OC (n = 643) for 6 or 13 cycles.


RESULTS
Overall/method-failure Pearl Indices were 0.88/0.66 with the patch and 0.56/0.28 with the OC (p = n.s.). Compliance was higher at all age groups with the patch compared to the OC. Significantly more users were very satisfied with the contraceptive patch than with the OC. The percentage of patch users being very satisfied increased with age whereas it did not in the OC group. Likewise, improvements of premenstrual symptoms as well as emotional and physical well-being increased with age in the patch-group in contrast to the OC group. Ratings of satisfaction with the study medication correlated weakly with emotional (r = 0.33) and physical well-being (r = 0.39) as well as premenstrual symptoms (r = 0.30; p < 0.001).


CONCLUSIONS
Contraceptive efficacy of the patch is comparable to OC, but compliance is consistently better at all age groups. Higher satisfaction with the patch at increasing age may be attributed to improvements in emotional and physical well-being as well as reduction of premenstrual symptoms.
Urdl
Wolfgang
W
Department for Obstetrics and Gynecology, Unit of Gynecological Endocrinology and Reproductive Medicine, University of Graz, Austria.
Apter
Dan
D
Alperstein
Alan
A
Koll
Peter
P
Schönian
Siegfried
S
Bringer
Jacques
J
Fisher
Alan C
AC
Preik
Michael
M
D000279:Administration, Cutaneous; D000284:Administration, Oral; D000328:Adult; D003271:Contraceptive Agents, Female / Q000008:administration & dosage*; D003278:Contraceptives, Oral, Hormonal / Q000008:administration & dosage*; D004334:Drug Administration Schedule; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D010349:Patient Compliance; D017060:Patient Satisfaction; D016896:Treatment Outcome
D003271:Contraceptive Agents, Female; D003278:Contraceptives, Oral, Hormonal