The Workplace on Ladies’s Well being (OWH) recommends the next tips for optimum effectiveness: Take Plan B One-Step or a generic model of Plan B as quickly as attainable, inside three days (72 hours) after unprotected intercourse. For the two-dose generic model of Plan B, which is known as Subsequent Alternative, take one tablet ASAP inside three days and the second tablet 12 hours afterward.
It’s essential to notice that emergency contraception is meant to guard towards being pregnant after a single act of penetrative penis-in-vagina intercourse. Meaning if you’ve unprotected intercourse, take Plan B, after which have unprotected intercourse once more, you have to to take Plan B once more.
Does Plan B have negative effects?
Plan B and different emergency contraceptive drugs are protected methods to forestall being pregnant. “The progesterone-like hormone in these drugs is one thing we’ve used for a very long time, and when folks have studied what occurs in people who use a number of repeat doses, it’s been proven to be protected,” Jessica W. Kiley, MD, MPH, an affiliate professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Northwestern College’s Feinberg College of Medication, tells SELF.
The potential short-term negative effects related to Plan B normally aren’t any extra severe than you would possibly expertise throughout PMS or a abdomen bug. Per the OWH, some folks might expertise complications, stomach ache, fatigue, dizziness, nausea, or breast ache. Plan B may have an effect on the timing of your subsequent interval. And, in accordance with Deliberate Parenthood, “there have been no reviews of significant issues out of the hundreds of thousands of people that’ve taken it.”
How do I do know if Plan B labored?
Some recognizing can occur after you’re taking an emergency contraceptive tablet, and your subsequent interval could also be irregular. The timing of your subsequent interval after taking emergency contraception varies. Andrea Henkel, MD, an obstetrics and gynecology doctor at Stanford Youngsters’s Well being, tells SELF it’s regular to get your interval a bit earlier or later after you’re taking emergency contraception, and that your interval could also be longer or shorter than regular. “With both, in case you are greater than per week late, it’s best to take a being pregnant check, as a result of this a lot of a delay might symbolize an early being pregnant,” Dr. Henkel says.
Can I take Plan B if I take contraception drugs?
The quick reply: sure. Many individuals use Plan B and different emergency contraception drugs as backup types of safety in the event that they neglect to take their day by day tablet—however you don’t must double up. “If utilizing your technique as prescribed, there is no such thing as a must take emergency contraception as a ‘again up,’” Dr. Henkel says. (In the event you’re on contraception drugs and forgot to take them persistently, it is likely to be time to contemplate a long-acting reversible contraceptive technique as a substitute, like the contraception implant or an IUD.)
You may also proceed utilizing your most popular technique of contraception as prescribed after utilizing Plan B. (If you’re utilizing Ella, the prescription morning-after tablet, then Dr. Henkel advises ready 5 days previous to restarting a hormonal contraceptive technique, like mixture contraception drugs, as they could work together with the emergency contraception.)
Will Plan B make it arduous for me to get pregnant in a while?
Some folks fear that taking Plan B will lower their probabilities of getting pregnant deliberately in a while, however by no means concern: Earlier than you google “can Plan B make you infertile,” the reply is unquestionably not. In keeping with the World Well being Group, “Medication used for emergency contraception don’t hurt future fertility,” and there’s additionally no delay in returning to fertility after utilizing Plan B.
So take coronary heart: There’s no must panic when you’re dealing with the prospect of unintended being pregnant. Plan B or different emergency contraceptives are protected and efficient—and may also help you deal with what occurs subsequent.
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