Health
Free Doula Program Seeks to Address Health Disparities for South Side Mothers
For many mothers, pregnancy can bring fear and uncertainty, especially when the pregnancy is considered high-risk.
For Tiara Proctor, that fear was constant.
“My entire pregnancy, (I was) very scared because they had told me not to get pregnant because with me having Graves’ (disease) and being high-risk, it could result in a miscarriage or a stillbirth,” Proctor said.
Proctor spent months worrying about the risks to her baby due to the autoimmune disorder Graves’ disease. Eventually, her doctor referred her to a free doula program.
“I was 30 years old, so I was like, I would like to live,” Proctor said. “So I told her, if possible, I would like to of course work with a Black doula.”
Proctor was connected with a program created through a partnership between the South Side Healthy Community Organization and the Chicago Birthworks Collective. The initiative provides free doula services to mothers on Chicago’s South Side who are uninsured or use Medicaid — helping remove financial barriers that often prevent access to this kind of care.
“Having them be able to access the doula services free of charge, I think that’s real great because that could be a barrier for some of the mothers who want doula services but they can’t afford the services,” said Keisha Taylor, a community health worker with the South Side Healthy Community Organization.
The program offers prenatal and postpartum visits, birth preparation and labor support services.
According to the Illinois Department of Public Health, Black women in Illinois are three times more likely to die from pregnancy-related medical conditions than White women. Many of those deaths happen weeks after delivery.
Joy Thomas, a doula with the Chicago Birthworks Collective, said her role goes beyond the delivery room.
“I always describe doulas, or in my doula work, that I am the eyes and the ears for you during your pregnancy, your birth and your postpartum,” Thomas said.
Thomas also owns a business called Choose Joy Doula Services. She said doulas can help fill gaps in support systems that may not always be available.
“Especially in the Black community, a lot of times, you know, it’s been said, like, oh, well you’ve got your auntie or you’ve got your grandma,” Thomas said. “But sometimes grandma and auntie have their own things going on. … Sometimes you need a middleman, you need a mediator or a moderator … to be able to help you successfully be a mother, successfully be a parent.”
This support can be important as maternity care becomes harder to access in parts of the South Side. Several hospitals have closed their obstetrics units in recent years, forcing many women to travel farther for care.
“It’s devastating because some mothers will have to go too far to get those services when they should be able to get them in the community that they live in,” Taylor said.
Taylor said she understands the need for support firsthand.
“I didn’t have nobody to advocate for me, nobody to speak up for me, nobody to take me through the breathing techniques, the labor positioning and things that the doulas do,” Taylor said. “I didn’t have that. … I come across a lot of mothers — not just older mothers, but young mothers — who have no idea on how the birth should go.”
For Proctor, having that support made all the difference.
On Christmas Day, she gave birth to her daughter, Nadia Lelia Joi, via cesarean section after experiencing complications, including preeclampsia and issues with an epidural.
“She was there when Nadia came out,” Proctor said of her doula. “She helped my sister. They got her dressed and fed her and took some pictures … because of course I was out of it.”
Thomas said representation also plays a powerful role in care.
“One of the things that is so important about having a doula is seeing someone who looks like you, who may have lived experiences (like yours), who can relate to you culturally,” Thomas said.
“A thing that helped me and saved me is that my attendings were Black women and listened to me, and they were big on making sure the whole person was OK,” Proctor said.
Advocates said expanding programs like this could help address disparities in maternal health outcomes and improve access to care.
“These programs need to be spread throughout the hospital so that the doctors know that they have these options because doulas are a support system to our medical providers,” Proctor said.
