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December 13, 2017
Terence Keller Driving Healthcare Equity
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Co-Founders and Instructers
C ontinueD froM f ront
monette’s top priorities.
“Making sure that people have
access to high quality health care,
and that includes birth control, is
so important for our communities,
Right. I mean, in the long run, it
keeps the community much more
healthy if we can have preventa-
tive care,” Symonette said.
Jimmy Radosta, Planned Par-
enthood’s local media relations
director, said reproductive health-
care disparities are rampant among
women of color. Latinas, Native
Americans, and African Ameri-
cans have higher rates of cervical
cancer than other groups and Af-
rican-American women have the
highest incidence rate of breast
cancer among women younger
than 45. Cervical and breast can-
cer screenings are one of the orga-
nization’s flagship services and 40
percent of their patients are people
of color, Symonette said.
Some of the other services
Planned Parenthood provides are
emergency contraception, fertili-
ty, sexually transmitted infection
testing, pregnancy testing and
counseling, well checks, sexual
education, abortion care (which
accounts for 6 percent of their
services), and emergency and pre-
ventative contraception medicine.
Back in October, the Trump ad-
ministration rolled out a mandate
which gives all employers, not just
religious institutions, the option
of not covering employees’ birth
control medicine on the grounds
of religious or other beliefs —a
move that overturned an Obama
era mandate from the Affordable
Care Act.
Planned Parenthood advocates
said this could cause as many as
360,000 women to lose coverage
of birth control medicine in Or-
egon in 2018, despite Oregon’s
Reproductive Health Equity Act
passed in August. The law will
expand Oregonians’ access to no-
cost reproductive health services
like contraception and prohibits
discrimination in the provision of
those services, but won’t fully go
into effect until 2019, hence the
gap in coverage.
According to a 2011 report
from the Guttmacher Institute,
58 percent of women have used
contraceptive medicine, at least
in part, for health needs other than
pregnancy prevention, including
endometriosis, fibroids, menstrual
regulation, and polycystic ovari-
an syndrome, which is prevalent
among women of color.
Besides the Planned Parent-
hood headquarters in northeast
Portland, the local chapter has
clinics in southeast Portland, Bea-
verton, Bend
Milwaukie-Oak
Grove, Salem and Vancouver. 94
percent of its over 72,000 annual
patient visits are for preventative
sexual health care like birth con-
trol, annual exams, screenings for
breast and cervical cancer, HIV
testing and counseling, and saf-
er sex counseling. 83 percent of
Planned Parenthood patients are
also low income.
As a health care practitioner
herself, through her acupuncture
business, Symonette said she saw
a need for people of color to re-
ceive culturally competent care.
“I’m a black, queer woman, so
I have a personal investment in
making sure that we’re an equi-
table and inclusive organization,”
Symonette said.
Symonette has overseen an
expansion of services during the
time she has served on the board.
She supported and advocated for
Planned Parenthood to start pro-
viding transgender hormone re-
placement therapy for people 18
or older, for instance, which just
began within the last couple of
years. That therapy started at the
clinic-level, Symonette said, and
then-CEO Stacy Cross also advo-
cated for it. It was later voted in
by the board as an official service
offering. And thanks to the Repro-
ductive Health Equity Act’s an-
ti-discrimination component, more
access to health services like this,
as well as cancer screening, will be
made available to trans people.
“We provide confidential care
and non-judgmental care. And I
think a lot of people come to us
for that. You know, you might not
feel comfortable going to your
primary care doctor to get, um,
trans-hormonal care, but maybe
you’re more inclined for Planned
Parenthood because you know
that we’re so supportive of our
communities that we serve,” Sy-
monette said.
Other services added in the last
five years include prenatal care
and telemedic services, which is
when patients can video confer-
ence a doctor or nurse practitioner,
for things like prescription refills,
remotely.
Symonette has personally
advocated for diversity within
the organization, promoting Af-
rican Americans, members of
the LGBTQ community, Native
Americans, Latinos, and Asians as
board members and creating two
equity and inclusion positions,
both of which were met with sup-
port from her fellow board mem-
bers.
She holds a bachelor’s degree
in biological psychology from
Western Washington University
and participated in federally fund-
ed neuroscience research while
there. She also has a master’s de-
gree in acupuncture and Oriental
medicine from Oregon College of
Oriental Medicine and her practice
specializes in women’s health-
care; fertility, anything related to
menstrual cycles, and menopause.
She has a 7 month old child with
her wife, Lai-Lani.
“I’m the first woman of color
to chair this board. It’s important
for us to see ourselves in places of
leadership. I think that that is part
of health equity,” Symonette said.