February 2023 - From the Desk of Debra Bingham

Dear Colleagues,

Happy February and Happy Black History Month. We are now 15 days into our 3^rd annual 28 Day Anti-Racism Challenge, and though we already have over 1,600 participants, we are excited that that number continues to grow every day. Anyone can join the Challenge at any time, so please do help us continue to share this work by promoting it to your friends, family, and colleagues.

With the Challenge we’ve been sharing daily ways to SPEAK UP and show RESPECT with prompts to reflect, learn and act. The first E in RESPECT stands for Equitable High Quality Care. I believe that perinatal health professionals want to provide high quality, equitable care to every patient they encounter. I also believe that most people do not wake up thinking – I want to do something today that is racist. I think we all go about our busy lives feeling like we have too much to do and that overall, we are good people, not a part of the problem. Too often we think we are not personally perpetuating perinatal disparities, or we don't know where to get started. Those are some of the reasons that maternal mortality disparities are one of the longest disparities in U.S. history. As pointed out by Ibram X. Kendi, we are all a part of the problem unless we are a part of the solution. Lack of action keeps the status quo in place. Thus, we all need to be active anti-racists. We need to work daily to dismantle racist structures and processes that unfairly advantage white people at the expense of Black people and other marginalized populations. 

The good news is that all of the racist structures and processes can be eliminated, which means that perinatal disparities can also be eliminated. For example, disparities from preventable childhood diseases were eliminated with the equitable distribution of vaccines. But these structures and processes weren't magically improved; it took effort. What we need are more QI leaders who do their work using a health equity lens. To help expand the number of leaders with QI + Equity expertise we are offering the Quality Improvement Essentials National Conference on June 6, 2023. This is also why our SPEAK UP Champions are provided support to create and implement individual QI action plans.

We also know that one of the first ways to lead change is to change the conversation. That is why we have created and launched the 28 Day Anti-Racism Challenge, v2. A fun addition this year is the use of badges, given to individuals for each week of the Challenge that they complete. To offer even more incentive, we’re also offering a 50% discount on the SPEAK UP CNE/CME modules once the challenge and post-event survey are completed. This discount is just another way to encourage our participants to stick with this important step in their anti-racism journey.

Ensuring equity is work we all need to do. Leading QI efforts utilizing a health equity lens is critical. Together we can make a huge impact!

With continued determination,

Debra Bingham