According to the Army Sample Survey of Military Personnel (as reported by Verdugo, 1996), 9 percent of enlisted females reported giving birth between spring 1994 and spring 1995. Pregnancy and childbirth accounted for 11 percent of the 27 percent absentee rate for women during this time period. The absentee rate for male soldiers was 17 percent. In the Army, the percentage of pregnant females is less than that among similarly aged females in the U.S. population as a whole. Taking the most recent civilian data available (Ventura et al., 1997), the percentages of females in each age group who gave birth in 1996 were as follows: 8.7 percent of those aged 18 to 19 years; 11.1 percent of those aged 20 to 24 years; 11.4 percent of those aged 25 to 29 years; and 8.5 percent of those aged 30 to 34 years.

Between December 18, 1995, and July 23, 1996, 80 of the 2,327 (3.4%) female soldiers deployed to the Operation Joint Endeavor were returned because of pregnancy. Eighty-eight other female soldiers were returned from the Operation Joint Endeavor for nonpregnancy-related medical reasons during this same time. Including all medical causes, 7.2 percent of the women were returned, compared with 2.5 percent of the men (Smith, 1996).

Navy hospital records on the annual number of pregnancies yield 8 to 9 percent of enlisted women (Calderon, 1994). Self-reported data from the Navy consistently have shown pregnancy rates to be 8 to 9 percent of enlisted women (Thomas and Edwards, 1989; Thomas and Thomas, 1993). Women under age 25 accounted for almost 65 percent of the pregnancies. Like their civilian counterparts, more than half of these younger servicewomen reported that the pregnancy was unplanned, although 56 percent had been using some form of birth control. The incidence of unplanned pregnancy constitutes a source of significant disability and affects readiness, according to CDR Michael John Hughey, MC, USNR (1996).

According to Bray (1996), the majority of active-duty women report easy access to OB/GYN care (73%), and most were satisfied with services received (62%). In 1995, about 18 percent of military women reported that they had been pregnant within the past year, and another 1.5 percent reported they may have been pregnant at the time of the survey. Across all services, 38 percent of military women had been pregnant in the past 5 years (Table A-5). The vast majority (82%) of military women who had been pregnant within the past 5 years received prenatal

Front Matter (R1-R16)

Executive Summary (1-24)

1 Introduction (25-32)

2 Body Composition (33-60)

3 Physical Fitness Policies and Programs (61-86)

4 Weight Management (87-108)

5 Nutritional Concerns of Military Women (109-126)

6 Pregnancy and Lactation and Postpartum Return-To-Duty Fitness (127-156)

7 Conclusions and Recommendations (157-170)

Appendixes (171-172)

A Workshop Summary, Agenda, Participants, and Abstracts (173-252)

B Practices and Policies Tables (253-262)

C Military Occupational Specialty Classification Tables (263-280)

D Search Strategy for Literature Review (281-284)

E Civilian Inquiry Letter and Table of Responses (285-290)

F Abbreviations (291-294)

G Bibliography (295-334)

H Biographical Sketches (335-338)

Index (339-352)