Triphasic Oral Contraceptives

Triphasic oral contraceptives have three different doses of the two hormones (estrogen and progestin) that make up the birth control pill. In each package of triphasic oral contraceptives there are four weeks worth of pills. The first three weeks of pills have the hormones in them, the last week are placebo pills (do not contain any hormones.) These are just a reminder pill to help a woman stay in the practice of taking the pill at the same time everyday. The first three weeks worth of pills all contain estrogen and either at a continuous dose or a change dose and the amount of progestin varies through the first three weeks of pills.

The Different Doses of Triphasic Oral Contraceptives

Since there are different brands of triphasic oral contraceptives, I cannot tell you the specific amount of estrogen and progestin that is contained in each pill through out the first three weeks of the packet of pills. What I can tell you is in most brands of triphasic oral contraceptives the color of the pill will change according to the week. The first week’s pills may be blue, weak two green, week three orange and week four the placebo pills may be pink. The color-coding of the pills is what determines how much of each hormone is in that week’s worth of pills. If you want to know each week’s dosage of the hormones that information should be included in the instruction and information package that comes with the pills. Triphasic oral contraceptives come in 21 day and 28 day (reminder pills) units.