About our e-newsletters
- Free e-newsletters
- Mayo Clinic expertise
- We do not share your e-mail address
Housecall, our weekly general-interest e-newsletter, keeps you up to date on a wide variety of health topics with timely, reliable, practical information, recipes, blogs, questions and answers with Mayo Clinic experts and more. Our biweekly topic-specific e-newsletters also include blogs, questions and answers with Mayo Clinic experts, and other useful information that will help you manage your health.
Housecall Archives
Mayo Clinic Housecall
Stay up to date on the latest health information.
What you get
- Free weekly e-newsletter
- Mayo Clinic expertise
- Recipes, tools and other helpful information
- We do not share your e-mail address
Definition
By Mayo Clinic staff
The morning-after pill is a type of emergency birth control that contains the hormone levonorgestrel, a progestin, (Plan B One-Step, Next Choice) or ulipristal acetate, a progesterone agonist-antagonist, (Ella).
The morning-after pill can be used after you've had unprotected sex. Depending on where you are in your menstrual cycle, the morning-after pill can prevent or delay ovulation, block fertilization, or keep a fertilized egg from implanting in the uterus. Don't take the morning-after pill if you're already pregnant.
Plan B One-Step, Next Choice and Ella are the only morning-after pills that have Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval in the U.S. (Plan B, which consists of two pills, is being phased out by its manufacturer.) However, many other brands of morning-after pills are available around the world.
If you're age 17 or older, Plan B One-Step and Next Choice are available over-the-counter at most pharmacies. If you are age 16 or younger or want to use Ella, you'll need a prescription from your health care provider.
- Updated FDA action on Plan B (levonorgestrel) tablets. U.S. Food and Drug Administration. http://www.fda.gov/bbs/topics/NEWS/2009/NEW01999.html. Accessed April 23, 2009.
- Plan B One-Step (prescribing information). Pomona, N.Y.: Duramed Pharmaceuticals Inc.; 2009. http://www.planbonestep.com/pdf/PlanBOneStepFullProductInformation.pdf. Accessed Nov. 17, 2009.
- Zieman M. Emergency contraception. http://www.uptodate.com/home/index.html. Accessed Sept. 29, 2009.
- Stewart F, et al. Emergency contraception. In: Hatcher RA, et al. Contraceptive Technology. 19th ed. New York, N.Y.: Ardent Media, Inc.; 2007:87.
- Emergency contraception. American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists. http://www.acog.org/publications/patient_education/bp114.cfm. Accessed Nov. 17, 2009.
- Plan B (prescribing information). Pomona, N.Y.: Duramed Pharmaceuticals Inc.; 2006. http://www.planbonestep.com/pdf/PlanBPI.pdf. Accessed Nov. 18, 2009.
- Next Choice (prescribing information). Corona, Calif.: Watson Laboratories Inc.; 2009. http://pi.watson.com/data_stream.asp?product_group=1648&p=ppi&language=E. Accessed Nov. 18, 2009.
- The marketing, education, distribution, and monitoring program for Plan B One-Step. U.S. Food and Drug Administration. http://www.accessdata.fda.gov/drugsatfda_docs/appletter/2009/021998s000ltr.pdf. Accessed Nov. 30, 2009.
- Spitz IM. Mifepristone for the medical termination of pregnancy. http://www.uptodate.com/home/index.html. Accessed Aug. 12, 2009.
- Harms RW (expert opinion). Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minn. Accessed Feb. 11, 2010.
- Ella (prescribing information). Morristown, N.J.: Watson Pharma, Inc.; 2010. http://caivn.org/sites/default/files/articles/022474s000lbl.pdf. Accessed Aug. 16, 2010.
Find Mayo Clinic on