Building an evidence base to inform interventions for pregnant and parenting adolescents: a call for rigorous evaluation.
Adolescent parents and their children are at increased risk for adverse short- and long-term health and social outcomes. Effective interventions are needed to support these young families. We studied the evidence base and found a dearth of rigorously evaluated programs. Strategies from successful interventions are needed to inform both intervention design and policies affecting these adolescents. The lack of rigorous evaluations may be attributable to inadequate emphasis on and sufficient funding for evaluation, as well as to challenges encountered by program evaluators working with this population. More rigorous program evaluations are urgently needed to provide scientifically sound guidance for programming and policy decisions. Evaluation lessons learned have implications for other vulnerable populations.
Office of Adolescent Pregnancy Programs, US Department of Health and Human Services, Rockville, MD 20852, USA. christina.lachance@hhs.gov
Christina R
CR
Lachance
Barri B
BB
Burrus
Alicia Richmond
AR
Scott
D000293:Adolescent; D005069:Evaluation Studies as Topic; D055317:Evidence-Based Practice; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D016487:Parenting; D010290:Parents / Q000193:education*; D011247:Pregnancy; D011253:Pregnancy in Adolescence / Q000517:prevention & control*; D014481:United States; D055815:Young Adult