[Mobile family planning units]. / Brigadas moviles.

PIP: The family planning organization Profamilia established its mobile clinic program in 1976 with the purpose of reaching remote rural and urban areas with voluntary surgical contraceptive services. The success of the mobile clinical-surgical program depends on surveying the area where the work is to be provided, determining the date of activities to start, providing information and education to motivate the community, selecting the contraceptive method and service, and providing follow-up service after the intervention. Profamilia was founded in September 1965, and 30 years later it provides 70% of family planning services in Colombia. Initially, the mobile programs of Profamilia offered only voluntary surgical contraception for women and men. Clients who were far from a family planning center were reached by the mobile clinic and transported to a nearby center. Since 1992 Profamilia has also begun a mobile program with a wide variety of services: temporary methods of family planning, cervical-uterine cytological tests, gynecological and prenatal consultations, infertility tests, and pregnancy tests. This has allowed the recovery of the costs of the program to increase from 50% when only surgical services were offered to 85% currently. This effort is one of the reasons why Colombia has a contraceptive prevalence rate of 72%, one of the highest in Latin America.^ieng