Introduction Decision aids (DA) are useful tools to promote shared decision making (SDM), but developing them from scratch is resource intensive. We adapted the Spanish version of ‘My Birth Control’ (developed in the USA) to our cultural context, to help patients choose a contraceptive method that best fits their needs and preferences.

Methods Following the cultural adaptation framework of health communication materials developed by the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control, we did a literature review of decision aids, selected and revised the content of ‘My Birth Control’, conducted interviews with physicians and patients to assess its comprehensibility and acceptability, and made a proposal for its cross-cultural adaptation.

Results The general reception of the DA was positive and participants considered it useful to address this topic. Specific modifications are necessary to adapt it to our context. We propose ensuring that the section of questions about personal preferences is available throughout the decision aid, and adapting theoretical information to content endorsed by the Argentine Ministry of Health guidelines. Additionally, including information on the accessibility and coverage of different contraceptive methods and reinforcing the prevention of sexually transmitted infections.

Discussion Some doctors and patients questioned the significance of delving into users’ preferences to make a decision, probably unfamiliar to the SDM approach. This is still a prevalent barrier in our setting, despite ongoing efforts to implement SDM. We hope the DA will help patients and healthcare professionals to have SDM conversations, but we acknowledge that we will need to complement it with other implementation strategies to improve its applicability.

Conclusions In order to ensure that healthcare professionals and patients have a good user experience with this DA, we consider necessary to make the proposed changes to adapt it to our sociocultural context and our usual medical practice.