{"id":321064,"date":"2025-10-21T11:42:17","date_gmt":"2025-10-21T11:42:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/321064\/"},"modified":"2025-10-21T11:42:17","modified_gmt":"2025-10-21T11:42:17","slug":"south-dallas-clinic-plans-to-build-the-neighborhoods-only-birthing-center","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/321064\/","title":{"rendered":"South Dallas clinic plans to build the neighborhood\u2019s only birthing center"},"content":{"rendered":"

Cessilye Smith was shocked when she saw the numbers for maternal and infant mortality rates for Black women. The most jarring part was the disparity between the rates for Black women and those of their white counterparts.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt messed me up,\u201d Smith said. \u201cIt really messed me up.\u201d<\/p>\n

Black women, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, are three times more likely to die<\/a> from a pregnancy-related cause when compared to white women. Similarly, according to the CDC, the infant mortality rate for Black women\u2019s babies is more than double the rate<\/a> for white women\u2019s babies.<\/p>\n

The disparities pushed Smith, a Fort Worth native, to open a maternal health clinic in South Dallas in 2020. <\/p>\n

The clinic, Abide Women\u2019s Health Services on Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, currently focuses on prenatal and postnatal care and lactation support. The staff in July launched a home birthing service, too. By the end of September, there had been three home births through Abide\u2019s service.<\/p>\n

Business Briefing<\/p>\n

Become a business insider with the latest news.<\/p>\n

By signing up, you agree to our\u00a0Terms of Service<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Privacy Policy.<\/a><\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

The exterior of Abide Women’s Health Services in Dallas on Tuesday, Sept. 30, 2025. The clinic is planning to build a new birthing center. <\/p>\n

Juan Figueroa \/ Staff Photographer<\/p>\n

But Smith and her team have plans to take the clinic a step further. Abide plans to build a full birthing center at the clinic site. Once it is up and running, it will be the only birthing center in the South Dallas neighborhood.<\/p>\n

\u201cResidents of South Dallas deserve excellent care. Period,\u201d Smith said. \u201cAnd they shouldn\u2019t have to drive outside of their community to access it.\u201d <\/p>\n

The clinic<\/p>\n

The Abide waiting room feels, almost, like a living room. <\/p>\n

There\u2019s a massive gray couch, L-shaped and taking up most of the waiting room. Two brown chairs, cushioned but with rocking feet, and two small bean bags complete the sitting area. To the side, there\u2019s a children\u2019s area, set up like a miniature kitchen and dining room.<\/p>\n

The homey feeling is intentional, and it\u2019s a feeling that carries into the exam rooms, too. Each exam room is decorated with cozy touches \u2014 small wooden bookshelves, for instance \u2014 and each one has a love seat, too, so that patients can comfortably bring a family member or friend with them.<\/p>\n

\"Cessilye<\/p>\n

Cessilye R. Smith, founder and CEO of Abide Women’s Health Services, poses for a photo at the clinic in Dallas on Tuesday, Sept. 30, 2025. The clinic is planning to build a new birthing center. <\/p>\n

Juan Figueroa \/ Staff Photographer<\/p>\n

Kennasha Jones, a midwife and Abide\u2019s director of client services, said the comfortable setting is intended to put patients at ease.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur clinic itself, while still sterile and meeting all the standards in that area, it\u2019s warm and inviting,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

In this space, the clinic staff has provided more than 1,000 clinical services during the first nine months of 2025, according to an Abide report. Those services have been almost entirely prenatal and postnatal care appointments. As of Sept. 31, the clinic\u2019s patients have reported 68 live births this year.<\/p>\n

While the clinic is, as Smith describes, \u201cunapologetically\u201d centered on Black women, that focus doesn\u2019t exclude any other demographics. Abide is open to all types of patients in need of prenatal, postnatal or lactation services. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe believe that when you center the most marginalized \u2014 those who are most impacted by health disparities \u2014 then it ends up helping everybody,\u201d Smith said.<\/p>\n

\"An<\/p>\n

An exam room at Abide Women’s Health Services in Dallas on Tuesday, Sept. 30, 2025. The clinic is planning to build a new birthing center. <\/p>\n

Juan Figueroa \/ Staff Photographer<\/p>\n

Smith is proud of the clinic\u2019s numbers and its human touch. Smith lives out-of-state now and, although she returns to Dallas regularly, she said it\u2019s the clinic staff who keep the operation running smoothly.<\/p>\n

Asia Jones, a midwife at Abide, said she focuses her work on providing patients with everything they need to have a smooth pregnancy. That includes building trust with patients who are fairly likely to have had negative medical experiences.<\/p>\n

Asia Jones thinks that is a big part of the reason that Abide\u2019s patients have better-than-average pregnancy outcomes.<\/p>\n

\u201cHonestly I think they\u2019re just listened to a lot more,\u201d she said. \u201cWe take their complaints seriously.\u201d<\/p>\n

Completing the circle<\/p>\n

Abide currently doesn\u2019t provide the full spectrum of pregnancy care to most patients. For delivery itself, the majority of patients go instead to hospital-based labor and delivery units, although each patient is equipped with an Abide-provided \u201cpassport\u201d that outlines all their relevant medical information. <\/p>\n

This summer, the clinic also launched a home birthing program, for patients who want that type of delivery experience. Smith sees that program as a \u201cbridge\u201d to the planned birthing center.<\/p>\n

Once the birthing center opens, patients will be able to deliver their babies at Abide, too. For now, the birthing center is still in the planning phases. Smith said the team aims to have it up and running in 2027.<\/p>\n

\"An<\/p>\n

An Easy Access Clinic Passport given to patients at Abide Women’s Health Services in Dallas on Tuesday, Sept. 30, 2025. The clinic is planning to build a new birthing center. <\/p>\n

Juan Figueroa \/ Staff Photographer<\/p>\n

Asia Jones said the birthing center will also give an out-of-hospital delivery option to patients who would like to deliver at home, but who don\u2019t have the home environment to do that. <\/p>\n

Some patients, for instance, might not have stable housing, or they might live in a shared space without enough privacy for a home birth, or they might not have reliable enough water service. Others simply live too far from a hospital to feel comfortable giving birth at home.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt would just break a large barrier for this community,\u201d Asia Jones said, \u201cto have a place they know they can go.\u201d<\/p>\n

The clinic leadership team had originally planned on building the birthing center in an empty lot adjacent to the clinic. In early October, though, Smith said Abide was shifting plans and would instead build an extension onto the existing clinic building.<\/p>\n

Kennasha Jones said the birthing center will \u201ccomplete the circle\u201d of Abide\u2019s care. She envisions the center as an extension of the existing Abide culture, providing a warm, respectful environment to women who may be sidelined or not taken seriously in other medical settings.<\/p>\n

Within this context, Kennasha Jones described Abide and its services as a safe place, a type of oasis.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s beautiful,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s a beautiful thing.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Cessilye Smith was shocked when she saw the numbers for maternal and infant mortality rates for Black women.…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":321065,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5135],"tags":[5229,1596,1141,881,14053,358,3187,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-321064","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-dallas","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-dallas","10":"tag-health-care","11":"tag-public-health","12":"tag-south-dallas","13":"tag-texas","14":"tag-tx","15":"tag-united-states","16":"tag-united-states-of-america","17":"tag-unitedstates","18":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","19":"tag-us","20":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115411979246512745","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/321064","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=321064"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/321064\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/321065"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=321064"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=321064"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=321064"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}