"Patients like us": pregnant and parenting teens view the health care system.

As a supplement to traditional ways of measuring health care quality, the patient's perspectve is an essential indicator, yet it is often overlooked in evaluations of health care for pregnant teenagers. This report reveals how 40 young women receiving publicly funded care viewed their physicians and the clinics and other facilities at which they received health care serv ces. Pregnant and parenting urban teens face stigmatization in many aspects of their lives. The author concludes, based on her interviews with the 40 teens, that providers and health care systems should combat such negative influences with support and respect for these patients. The data also point to the need for comprehensive health care for low-income adolescents that extends beyond prenatal care, which may focus on the needs of the fetus or infant to the exclusion of the needs of the young mother.