Emergency Levonorgestrel Oral: Dosing and Precautions
Emergency levonorgestrel guidance for unprotected intercourse, including extended-window use and enzyme-inducer dose adjustment.
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Guide category
Oral drugs
Safety boundary
Educational medicine information, not personal medical advice.
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Therapeutic action
Hormonal contraceptive, progestogen.
Indications
Emergency contraception after unprotected or inadequately protected intercourse such as a forgotten pill or condom breaking.
Forms and strengths
- 1.5 mg tablet.
Dose and duration
- One 1.5 mg tablet, whatever the day of the cycle, as soon as possible after unprotected or inadequately protected intercourse, preferably within the first 72 hours.
- It is recommended to administer treatment up to 120 hours (5 days) after unprotected intercourse.
Contra-indications, adverse effects, precautions
- May cause disturbance of the next menstrual cycle, metrorrhagia, nausea, headache, and dizziness.
- Re-administer treatment immediately if vomiting occurs within 2 hours of taking treatment.
- Double the dose to 3 mg single dose in women taking enzyme-inducing drugs because they can reduce contraceptive effectiveness.
- Pregnancy: if used during an undiagnosed pregnancy or if treatment fails, there is no known harm for the foetus.
- Breast-feeding: no contra-indication.
- Emergency contraception is intended to prevent pregnancy; it cannot terminate an ongoing pregnancy.
Source
MSF Essential drugs practical guidelines (January 2026)
This page combines source-derived medicine reference sections with Kenza editorial context, while leaving out the Storage and Remarks sections from the source batch.
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