Founded and led by the Black Mamas Matter Alliance (BMMA), the Black Maternal Health Conference and Training InstituteTM (BMHC24) is the official, global assembly for Black Maternal health, equity, scholarship, innovation, policy, and advocacy work, projects, practice, and initiatives. BMHC24 centers Black people, clinicians, professionals, practitioners, and advocates; and welcomes ALL maternal, perinatal, and reproductive health equity stakeholders who are seeking to develop professionally, learn, and network.
The following Training Institute Sessions are available:
Conducting Culturally Responsive Focus Groups in Research and Evaluation
BMMA
Ms. Mitchell is a qualitative and mixed methods research and evaluation methodologist. Her work is grounded in critical, culturally responsive, community-engaged, and decolonizing traditions and paradigms. Currently, Ms. Mitchell is a Vice President at Reproductive Health (RH) Impact and leads the organization’s Research and Policy Center. She is also a Collaborator with Black Mamas Matter Alliance and serves as a Senior Advisor for their Research and Evaluation Department.
Ms. Mitchell received a B.A. in Anthropology from Georgia State University, a Master of Public Health from Morehouse School of Medicine, a graduate certificate in Program Evaluation from the University of Connecticut and is currently pursuing her Ph.D. in Qualitative Research and Evaluation Methodologies from the University of Georgia.
BMMA
Dr. Ayanna Robinson is the Research and Evaluation Director for Black Mamas Matter Alliance. She has over 15 years of research and evaluation experience and has led and consulted on numerous maternal and child health projects and initiatives. She received her Ph.D. in Health Promotion and Behavior from the University of Georgia and a Certificate in Interdisciplinary Qualitative Research Studies, and Master of Public Health degree from Morehouse School of Medicine.
As a public health researcher and evaluator experienced in qualitative and quantitative methods, she is committed to translating research into action and amplifying the voices and experiences of Black women and birthing individuals. Ayanna is also the founder of Black Girls’ Breastfeeding Club, which promotes breastfeeding and informed infant feeding decisions through research, education, and resources and the bEarth (pronounced “birth”) Work App, which connects pregnant and postpartum women and birthing people to culturally congruent online classes spanning prenatal through postpartum health.
Focus groups are a commonly used qualitative method across research studies and program evaluation. Culturally responsive focus groups allow researchers to challenge assumptions and stereotypes and center often excluded voices. This training will provide attendees with an overview of culturally responsive focus groups, including the principles for developing and best practices for culturally responsive focus groups, frameworks, and considerations across design, implementation, analysis. Over the course of this workshop, participants will engage in hands-on practice with designing and implementing culturally responsive focus groups across the research and/or evaluation process.
By the end of this training, participants will be able to:
- Define the principles of culturally responsive focus groups
- Apply principles across design, implementation, and analysis
Participants should have a basic understanding of conducting focus groups.
Heart Focus: Connecting the Dots between Preeclampsia Awareness and Human Lactation
Perinatal Health Equity Initiative
Dr. Nastassia Harris, a seasoned healthcare professional with over 20 years of specialized experience in perinatal care, serves as a beacon of change in addressing racial disparities in maternal and infant health. Dr. Harris is an active participate in her professional organization AWHONN and is the 2024 recipient of the prestigious Diversity Equity and Inclusion Leadership Award, as a registered nurse and International Board-Certified Lactation Consultant (IBCLC), her expertise extends to founding The Perinatal Health Equity Initiative, a non-profit dedicated to eradicating these disparities using a reproductive justice framework.
Driven by her academic background, including a BSN, MSN-ED, and a DNP in Educational Leadership, she leads Ignite Maternal Health, focusing on postpartum and newborn nursing education. Actively engaged in esteemed committees and organizations, she conducts groundbreaking research published in prestigious journals, shedding light on implicit bias in healthcare, breastfeeding disparities in the Black community, obstetrical violence, high-risk obstetrics, and reproductive justice. Dr. Harris’s impactful work has been recognized by major media outlets, showcasing her commitment to advancing equitable healthcare practices for mothers and infants.
This comprehensive workshop is split into two parts. The first half will provide an introduction to preeclampsia and its connection to the maternal health crisis and hands-on skills to teach attendees how to assess blood pressure. The second half of the class will connect heart health to human lactation by providing a workshop on cultural congruence in breastfeeding/chestfeeding specific to Black women, with skills stations for attendees to better assist families in the community.
By the end of this training, participants will be able to:
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- Verbalize the signs and symptoms of preeclampsia by the end of class
- Demonstrate two lactation skills by the close of the class.
No prior training is required for the pre-eclampsia portion of the training. For the lactation skills, attendees should have a basic lactation foundation as this class is mostly clinically focused and not didactic.
Trauma Informed Care For Ourselves & Our Community
Birthing Advocacy Doula Trainings
Sabia Wade (she/they) is a Black, queer, CEO, author, educator, full-spectrum doula, investor, and expander of Black luxury. Sabia is the founder of Birthing Advocacy Doula Trainings, an accessible and inclusive training program for community care workers, and For the Village, a non-profit providing doulas at no or low-cost to low-income and marginalized communities in San Diego.
As a coach, board member, investor, educator, and programming development consultant for organizations throughout the Birth and Reproductive Health Industry, every part of Sabia’s work centers on liberation of all people through Reproductive Justice. Her book, Birthing Liberation: How Reproductive Justice Can Set Us Free, is now available for purchase. Additionally, Sabia is a certified reiki practitioner, death doula, somatic practitioner, human design reader, wedding officiant, and is currently working toward becoming a Spiritual Director!
Birthing Advocacy Doula Trainings
Iya Mystique is a “unicorn”, Blactinx queer femme, and certified radical birth worker in traditional community birth work, lactation, research, education, and an aspiring UX unicorn engineer. With a Master of Science in Clinical Mental Health Counseling, Iya Mystique is a trained newborn care specialist and advanced holistic plant medicine practitioner. Featured in PUSH for Midwives campaign, Iya Mystique specializes in Caribbean-Indigenous practices in their role as an initiated Ifa priestess in perinatal health, reproductive health and justice, “Blactation” (Black lactation), and healing justice for Black LGBTQ+ communities where they also serve in their role as Parents Magazine’s Expert Review Board member. Iya Mystique’s vision is to infuse their love for tech, birth, postpartum, healing, education, and lactation into their future full-spectrum, tech practice.
In this workshop, we will discuss the elements of trauma-informed care to assist ourselves and the people we serve in this work. Topics will include understanding the traumainformed care model, defining advocacy, and the importance of inclusion and intersectionality. With all this information, we will build tangible ways to care for ourselves and the communities we serve.
By the end of this training, participants will be able to:
- Understanding the trauma informed care model and advocacy principles
- Understanding inclusion and intersectionality
- Building a plan of care for ourselves and our communities to include in their birth work practice
No prerequisites, birth workers and care workers of any experience level are welcome.
First Trimester Abortion Skill Workshop
Ubuntu Black Family Wellness Collective
Dr. Michelle Drew (she/her) is an award-winning nurse, midwife, author, activist, and the Executive Director and founder of Ubuntu Black Family Wellness Collective: a Black woman-led, grassroots community healthcare concern focused on closing the healthcare gaps in Wilmington Delaware’s Black mamas and babies through quality healthcare, education, community empowerment, and activism. She is the recipient of the 2022 American College of Nurse-Midwives Health Equity Award. Dr. Drew’s political activism originates from her family’s involvement in the Civil Rights Movement.
She dedicates her time and energy to her busy clinical practice and working at the local, state and federal levels to generate and support legislation that ensures access to equitable culturally rooted, community based reproductive healthcare services and protects abortion access. As a nurse, midwife, and family nurse practitioner, abortion provider and mentor, Dr. Drew has spent her entire career, in healthcare systems that serve the socially and politically disenfranchised; using her voice to ensure respectful care for Black and Brown families.
She has attended the births of more than 3,000 babies and counting with a career unplanned cesarean rate of 6.75% and never a maternal or fetal loss attending births in every setting on x3 continents. Dr. Drew earned her master’s degree in public health with a focus on maternal child health and tropical diseases from Tulane University, a master’s in nursing from Vanderbilt University, and a doctorate in nursing practice from Texas Woman’s University. But she is most proud of being a tenth-generation midwife and healer and keeper of birth traditions passed down in her family for more than 270 years.
While all pregnancies end, not all pregnancies end in a live birth. Midwives are more than baby catchers. Midwives have always held the role of trusted, full scope, holistic sexual and reproductive health care providers for people capable of pregnancy, including those seeking abortion. Advanced practice clinicians and family physicians can safely perform uterine evacuation procedures and provide medication abortions. Manual vacuum aspiration (MVA) is already a necessary and life-saving skill for midwives who manage miscarriage and post-abortion complications as well as abortion care in the 15 states and U.S. territories where advance practice clinicians are permitted to perform abortion care. In this interactive workshop, we will unpack and dismantle the puritanical heteronormative patriarchal motives behind abortion restriction and the sequestration of abortion as a medical procedure specific to physician practice. The workshop will include the pre-, intra-, and post-procedure care of patients seeking medication abortion and MVA. Participants will experience hands-on simulations of manual vacuum aspiration techniques. These skills are applicable to miscarriage management as well, enabling clinicians to care for pregnant people throughout the full spectrum of pregnancy outcomes. The program provides the basic information necessary for provision of care and includes resources for further study. Special attention will be given to values clarification for providers and considerations for non-directive options counseling for patients seeking care.
By the end of this training, participants will be able to:
- State the place of abortion services in holistic reproductive care.
- Explain why uterine evacuation is an essential part of reproductive health services
- Verbalize indications, contraindications and alternatives to manual vacuum aspiration for management of first trimester abortion and management of missed or incomplete abortions.
- Demonstrate the use of shared decision-making to counsel people seeking first trimester abortions or considering manual evacuation of products of conception in first trimester missed/incomplete abortion.
- Complete a simulated uterine evacuation using manual vacuum aspiration (MVA).
- Verbalize signs and symptoms of complications and understand management complications from uterine evacuation with MVA.
- Verbalize confidence in their ability to integrate uterine evacuation with MVA into their present reproductive health services and organize and monitor the services.
- Demonstrate counseling clients on postabortion contraception.
This course is for any provider who offers reproductive health services including midwives, nurse practitioners and physician’s associates, and family physicians or students nearing graduation in those professions.
