Investing in comprehensive women’s health services not only saves lives, but also reduces long-term health care costs, ensuring healthier futures for mothers and their children. Despite these benefits, access to care is not widespread. Stark health disparities persist: Black women are three to four times more likely to die from pregnancy-related causes than white women, largely due to disparities in access to quality health care. Preventive health services are also crucial; only 65% of women in low-income communities receive regular Pap smears, compared to 85% in higher-income areas. Regular screenings can reduce the incidence of cervical cancer by up to 80%.
Sun River Health is dedicated to bridging this gap by providing expert prenatal, postpartum, and general women’s health care through a compassionate and highly skilled team of OB/GYN clinicians, midwives, and family physicians. We help nearly 30,000 women each year stay healthy at every stage in life. Our gynecological services include: pelvic exams, PAP smears, and testing and treatment for STIs, in addition to information on family planning, birth control, prenatal care, menopause/hormone replacement therapy, and WIC (Women, Infants, and Children) healthy food and nutrition services.
Support from our donors has helped Sun River Health in our goal to provide more women with the unique care they need, and to ensure the health of future generations through comprehensive and compassionate care. Cervical cancer is the fourth most common cancer in women. Sun River Health serves patients experiencing higher rates of new cervical cancer cases. These higher rates may reflect differences in cervical cancer screening rates and outcomes that vary by socioeconomic status and access to quality care. Recently, to mitigate some of these factors, Sun River Health has begun a push for Cervical Screening interventions – supporting our patient population in completing their cervical cancer screening during an office visit, as women often feel uncomfortable and “not ready” to complete the screening. Prevention and early detection make all the difference with respect to treatment and further interventions down the road.
Funds from Sun River Health Foundation have sponsored 400 hygiene kits, which include travelsized necessities such as wipes, hand sanitizer, and body wash. These kits are distributed to women during an office visit to remove the barriers to completing the cervical cancer screening – hopefully identifying, and ultimately lowering, the rates of new cervical cancer cases in our patients.
