Well-Woman Care

"Well-Woman Care" is a phrase often used to describe the care that midwives provide to non-pregnant women. Well-woman care includes yearly physical exams, providing contraception, preconception counseling, menopausal care and addressing common health concerns.

Gynecological Care/Complete Physical Exam

The motto of the American College of Nurse-Midwives is: "With Women for a Lifetime." I see women for gynecological care from the teenage years, through menopause and beyond.

Nurse-midwives are experienced in, and qualified to perform, women's physical exams, including breast exam, pap smear, general health assessment, and screening for diseases. Often women will have specific concerns about body changes, questions about birth control or sexually transmitted diseases. This is a good time to address questions and concerns together.

I provide all the above services and can provide an alternative to visiting a physician once a year. The exam is gentle and respectful. My goal is for women to be as involved with and as knowledgeable about their bodies as possible. I try to make the pelvic exam more comfortable both physically and emotionally. A woman will have the option of remaining more upright for the exam and viewing their cervix in a mirror.

Family Planning/Birth Control

Many families choose to use some sort of family planning to limit or space pregnancies. Others choose not to use any family planning. In my practice I respect each of these choices and provide an alternative to a doctor's office visit for most of these methods.

No birth control method is perfect. Each presents possible undesired side effects or consequences. However, people have different bodies, different priorities and different sexual practices. Each of these differences should be considered in choosing and implementing a birth control method. What may be an ideal method at one point in a person's life, is often not a good choice at another time.

Family planning can be as natural as using breastfeeding to prevent ovulation, or fertility awareness to determine when a woman can become pregnant. Other couples use barrier, hormonal or surgical contraception.

During a physical exam or postpartum exam I can help you decide on a family planning method that is right for you. I am knowledgeable about all methods of available birth control and can provide education for natural methods, fitting for barrier methods such as cervical caps and diaphragms or prescriptions for hormonal methods such as Depo-Provera injections and birth control pills.

I can also refer you to another provider for a vasectomy, tubal ligation, or IUD placement.

You can be assured that I will be thorough and nonjudgmental during our visit.

Preconception Care and Counseling

A baby's health while developing depends in part on their parent's health before the moment of conception. Any routine gynecological exam can potentially be a pre-conception visit if you are considering pregnancy or are likely to become pregnant. Ideally, a special appointment can be made when the I can meet with both potential parents.

When planning a pregnancy, here are some things we can consider together:

• Optimal timing of pregnancy

• Achieving a normal weight

• Review of the food and drugs each potential parent consumes

• Pelvic exam, including pap smear and testing for sexually transmitted diseases or other infections if necessary.

• Family health histories of each potential parent and the potential risks to your future child(ren).

• Taking supplements: at a minimum, women are encouraged to take a multi-vitamin containing 0.8 mcg of folic acid daily

• Emotional readiness for being a parent.

• Community resources that may be of help to you.

Sometimes people discover it is not as easy for them to conceive as they had assumed. Before opting for expensive and invasive assisted reproduction medicine I can help determine if difficulty conceiving has a simpler solution. Physical exam, laboratory blood tests, an introduction to the fertility cycle and some supplements may optimize your chances of conceiving normally.

Other Common Health Concerns/Primary Care

In addition to basic nurse-midwifery care, I can also be a resource for other health concerns such as body weight issues, depression, anxiety, minor viral and bacterial infections, and high cholesterol. My experience with primary care issues is stronger in some areas than others, you can trust me to be honest about my skill level with specific concerns.