A Solution to Columbus’ Black Maternal & Infant Mortality Epidemic

The Why…

In May of 2017, Jessica M. Roach, a Nurse, Doula, Midwife and public health professional made a call that would change the way our country viewed the Black maternal and infant mortality epidemic. She made the call because she felt that Black families had endured enough trauma in their pregnancy and childbirth experiences. Jessica, during her 20 years as a Birthworker had never lost a baby or mother, but she had witnessed and experienced this same trauma.

She became frustrated by the ongoing mistreatment, inaccurate medical information, and other unnecessary interventions born from institutionalized obstetric racism. This racism includes comments from physicians during labor that say “…our little Black babies are just a little weaker.”, or that “Black women are just at higher risk for problems.” without any explanation or clinical rationale. Jessica knew that the result of this malpractice or obstetric racism has a disproportionately adverse impact on Black families.

For Jessica, each circumstance was reminiscent of her own highrisk pregnancy. At the time, she did not have any unmet social determinants of health or “risk factors” that are commonly linked to pregnancy comorbidities or mortality. She was a middle-class professional, who was educated and married, with stable housing, food and healthcare access, but… she was Black too.

Regardless, she refused to believe that being Black was a health risk factor. In fact, Jessica has said repeatedly that “…there is nothing wrong with us, genetically or biologically. You really can’t say that poverty or being unmarried is a cause, considering we have these health issues regardless of our income and marital status”. Race alone, in her opinion, was not the health risk factor, racism was. Knowing the political and medical community was going to deny racism as the primary health risk factor, Jessica turned to a longtime colleague and friend who had dedicated his life and career to our community, unapologetically.

The Call…

In May 2017, Jessica made a call that would change the way our country viewed the Black maternal and infant mortality epidemic. She called Dorian L. Wingard, a c-suite and senior level public administrator, human services expert, community advocate, and public policy professional. Dorian is a known member of the Black Columbus community. His tenacity and dedication to the strengthening of Black families has always been at the forefront of his professional and personal experiences.

When Jessica called him about the abysmal rates by which Black infants and mothers were dying, as well as significant concerns about the City of Columbus initiative, he wasn’t surprised. He like so many others “knew” but didn’t really “know” just how extensive the epidemic had become. He also remained very supportive but had question. The answers while infuriating, were not surprising to him. He and Jessica shared the same value constructs rooted in the tradition of the Black family and Black communities. Dorian and Jessica decided to combine their professional and clinical experience in commitment to developing what ROOTT has become today.

The Action…

For nearly a year, Jessica reached out to Columbus City leaders, Columbus Public Health, and the newly formed CelebrateOne to discuss the disproportionate Black infant mortality issue. She also wanted to collaborate and provide solutions to directly rebuke the obstetric racism, central to the cause of the growing health disparity gap between Black and white infants. None of the official entities would engage her and denied that obstetric (systemic/institutional) racism was the primary issue. Moreover,

SPECIAL MESSAGE FROM ROOTT continued from page 10: age 5 of the children if necessary. Average engagement period for a family is 18-24 months. these same leaders had committed resources to focusing on the ABCs of Safe Sleep. It was the combination of these factors that gave birth to ROOTT.

Restoring Our Own Through

Transformation, known by its national and local communities and partners as ROOTT. ROOTT is a collective of concerned Black Families, community members, advocates & interdisciplinary professionals dedicated to decreasing maternal & infant mortality in Ohio. ROOTT’s mission is to comprehensively restore our collective well-being through collaboration, resource allocation, research & empowerment, in order to meet the needs of parents & families within communities.

ROOTT understands that negative stereotypes and images have impacted our existence in the United States for centuries and will for some time to come. False stories about Black families have been built into all life domains, including the medical and public health professions. These narratives often list being poor, uneducated, drug and/or alcohol abusers, and absent fathers as the causes of the disproportionate rate of Black maternal and infant mortality. It is through this lens of deficit that we are viewed as broken, unhealthy, and not given the same respect or autonomy over our decisions as any other race of people. Furthermore, it is the same racist ideology that has continued to guide public obstetric health policy that not only supports the theory of Black deficit but upholds it. ROOTT rejected this notion.

The Impact…

Since January 2018, ROOTT has served approximately 700 families through its Perinatal Support Doula (PSD) Services. Those services include family planning, childbirth education, nutrition counseling, prenatal and postpartum health assessments and other supports when needed. ROOTT PSDs are certified through its own training model, which includes a yearlong apprenticeship.

ROOTT PSDs address both the clinical and non-clinical prenatal needs of Black families. Services can be provided throughout the entire prenatal, labor and delivery, and postpartum period, up to

Through its comprehensive health equity model for Black families, ROOTT has achieved and maintained a 0% Black maternal and infant mortality rate since its inception. Their preterm and low birth weight is less than 6%, their NICU rate is a 1/3 of the national average for Black Infants and their post-partum hemorrhage rate, one of the leading causes of maternal death, is less than 3%.

While ROOTT families enjoy these healthy birth outcomes, many Black families not served by ROOTT are not as fortunate. A recent report by the National March of Dimes, that offers letter grades to cities and states for their rate of preterm birth outcomes, gave the state of Ohio a “D” and the city of Columbus an “F” for 2021. In addition, the current report from CelebrateOne for Franklin County shows that Black infants continue to unnecessarily die, at nearly 4x the rate of white infants.

ROOTT has essentially eliminated the mortality rate among the families it serves. They believe that it is the unique ROOTT model that centers the WHOLE family, without silos that is the lead contributor successful outcomes for families. ROOTT believes Black families come with a knowledge of what they want from their experiences and is here to help families find the tools for their own re-empowerment. ROOTT is clearly helping to making Cbus great again, one Black family at a time.