UC Berkeley associate professor Anu Gómez has been awarded a two-year grant by Arnold Ventures to study the current state of contraceptive access and demand in the United States.

The $621,196 grant will help her team create a new way to measure contraceptive need by gaining a more holistic understanding of users’ concerns, according to Gómez, director of the Sexual Health and Reproductive Equity, or SHARE, Program at UC Berkeley’s School of Social Welfare.

Typically, government agencies and researchers look at contraceptive access through conventional means, such as examining the percentage of people utilizing a certain method. According to Gómez, however, this system ignores the actual people using contraception.

“In theory, all people are being ignored because we don’t have a person-centered focus,” Gómez said.

Gómez’s work aims to redefine contraceptive needs by centering lived experiences. This includes studying whether or not people’s demands are truly being met, as well the potential barriers they could face trying to access contraception, according to Gómez.

Gómez sees this impacting the BIPOC community in particular. She added that the community has historically faced reproductive oppression and is often depicted as “problematic reproducers.”

“(My work) offers the opportunity to reframe that narrative,” Gómez said. “(It) gives us much more information about policies and programs that can really best meet people’s needs.”

Her research would utilize a three-part process to measure national contraceptive needs. This includes working with stakeholders from diverse backgrounds and reproductive justice groups advocating for marginalized communities’ access to contraceptives.

Gómez will also administer a nationwide survey to gain more nuanced feedback. She then hopes to use that information to point her in the right direction of where to properly direct resources and policy strategy, as well as reexamine some of the questions she was originally asking and offer solutions.

“There are a lot of assumptions about where people are falling through the cracks, but we’re not really asking them about it,” Gómez said. “ If we have that information we can really actually much more effectively use resources, and hopefully create better systems, better healthcare.”

Some questions Gómez plans on exploring include the best method of contraception and identify amplifying solutions that could accommodate the barriers people face.

For instance, Gómez said her team has seen people living in rural areas being unable to access proper contraception because of factors like distance and the lack of health care options in their areas. Her team would suggest recommendations like telemedicine.

“97% of all U.S. women have ever used a method of contraception,” Gómez said. “So it’s also … (an) almost universal experience.”