IDA MAE PATTERSON CENTER FOR MATERNAL AND INFANT WELLNESS

The Ida Mae Patterson Center for Maternal & Infant Wellness is founded on the tenets of the Village Circle Approach™. The center offers Community-Embedded Group Prenatal Care, designed to support, protect and provide community-based clinical care to African-American childbearing persons, families, and others.

Donate to the Ida Mae Center

PRENATAL CARE AT THE CENTER

Care Participants — enrolled pregnant clients— will receive care in supportive cohorts of their peers that focus on perinatal education, informed consent, community nurturance and support, all in a culturally validating environment.

The Village Circle Approach™ aims to eliminate the damaging consequences of racism in prenatal care currently demonstrated within standard medical models of care. The model focuses on clinical excellence, client autonomy, and group determination all in an environment of cultural validation and celebration.

NOW OPEN!

Interested prenatal clients can contact clinic staff at idamaecenter@uzazivillage.org or call 816-541-3718

 

Read about The Village Circle Approach™

Care will be provided by multidisciplinary staff of:

Midwives

Doulas

Herbalists

Community Life & Wellness Coordinator

Lactation Specialists

Ida Mae Center Virtual Orientation

Care participants that have recently been signed up for services through the Ida Mae Patterson Center are required to go through orientation before attending their appointments. Orientations are held virutally on the first Friday of every month on Zoom 6–7pm.

IDA MAE CENTER ORIENTATION

Learn more about the Ida Mae Patterson Center for Maternal & Infant Wellness

IDA MAE CLINIC PRESS RELEASE
CLINIC INFORMATIONAL INTERVIEW

4232 Troost Avenue, Kansas City, MO 64110  •  (816) 541-3718

WEBSITE CREATED BY LILLIAN JAMES CREATIVE

The Village Circle Approach™

The Ida Mae Patterson Center for Maternal and Infant Wellness is a Perinatal Safe Spot and a Black Sacred Space for prenatal care. The Ida Mae Clinic utilizes the Village Circle Approach™  

Description:

The Village Circle Approach™ is an Afro-Centric Group Prenatal Care Model designed to support, protect and provide community-based clinical care to childbearing persons and families of the African diaspora, The model allows for a group prenatal care concept in which pregnant persons move though care in support cohorts of their peers that focus on perinatal education informed consent, community nurturance and support, excellence in clinical care, all in a culturally validating environment.  This is the chosen care approach for the Ida Mae Patterson Center for Maternal and Infant Wellness (Ida Mae Clinic) at Uzazi Village in Kansas City, MO. 

Purpose:

The purpose of this approach to care is to eliminate racially-embedded health disparities in prenatal care currently demonstrated within standard medical models of care.  This approach focuses on clinical excellence, client autonomy, and group determination all in an environment of cultural validation and celebration.  African-Americans bear the brunt of negative health consequences in a white-supremist, oppressive and punitive healthcare system that fails to recognize the humanity and value of African-American persons.  The current system of healthcare cannot meet the complex needs of childbearing persons of the Black diaspora and cannot solve the problem of health inequity in its current state. It is therefore incumbent upon those who understand the problem in all its nuances to offer viable solutions.  The Village Circle Approach™ is designed to bridge the care/outcome gap with care that recognizes and honors the humanity of persons of the African diaspora.

Features:

Features of this model will include aspects of care in a healthcare setting that are Afro-Centric by nature and celebrate Black ‘Ways of Being.’ These features include:

  • Group education
  • Relational interaction with care partners
  • Equalized (rather than hierarchical) power structures
  • Shared decision-making and informed consent or non-consent
  • Culturally congruent staffing
  • Celebration of Black peoples and Black culture