Health care services and sterilization among Puerto Rican women.

This paper considers the variables related to the type of health care utilization for sterilization and family planning among Puerto Rican women. The study is based on a representative sample of 1,375 women between the ages of 15-49 years. The data shows that the majority of women used the private sector of health care for their sterilization. Younger women, women with a low level of education, unemployed, living in consensual marriages and those who had their children as adolescents, made more use of the public services for their sterilization. It is a well proven fact that women with the above mentioned characteristics are more socioeconomically deprived than the educated, married and working women. Thus, it is to be expected that this group of women does not have the economic resources needed to utilize the private health care system.