Phone App Lets You Get Birth Control Without Going To The Doctor

A San Francisco-based startup launched a new telemedicine app in Indiana this week that connects women with a birth control prescription. As Indiana Public Broadcasting’s Barbara Brosher reports, Nurx delivers contraceptives to women’s homes without requiring they make a physical trip to the doctor.

Here’s how the app works: women access Nurx on their phones or computers and are prompted to either choose their preferred birth control or have a doctor select the prescription for them.

Women are then asked to answer a series of medical questions, which a doctor will evaluate using Centers for Disease Control guidelines before writing a prescription that can be delivered or picked up at a pharmacy.

Nurx CEO Hans Gangeskar says the goal is to expand access to contraceptives, not replace in-person visits to the doctor.

“Previously it was thought that if you withheld certain services for people who wouldn’t come into the doctor’s office, they were more likely to come into the doctor’s office,” he says. “But, a wealth of information shows that doesn’t work. And, what works is to give people what they need in a safe and convenient manner.”

Legislation passed in 2016 allows doctors to prescribe some medications without seeing a patient in person.

Upper Midwest Telehealth Resource Center Program Director Becky Sanders says the expansion of telemedicine is helping more Hoosiers access preventative healthcare.

“We’re really seeing telehealth last year and this year legislatively coming into mainstream where more and more people have either had a telehealth visit, or actually can define it,” Sanders says.

Sanders says she expects to see more apps like Nurx come to the state as telemedicine becomes more popular.