Teenage Pregnancy in Perspective

In an effort to provide the clinician with suggestions for preventive and remedial approaches to adolescent pregnancy, the nature, medical, social, eco nomic, and psychological aspects of the problem are reviewed and discussed. While the rate of adolescent pregnancy is declining, there are more than 560,000 deliveries to teenagers annually. Medical risks are significantly diminished by early and comprehensive prenatal care. The major complica tions continue to be social and economic. Lower I.Q.s in offspring of adoles cent mothers have been reported. Failure to complete high school significantly increases the risk of unemployment, trapping the premature parent and her offspring in a web of poverty. A lack of a sense of future and viable alterna tives may legitimize the option of motherhood in the minds of many adolescent girls. Furthermore, an ignorance and a denial of sexuality combined with the developmental imperatives of experimentation and rebellion place the adolescent at high risk for pregnancy.