It was chaos as I got off the elevator.
I was coming back on duty as a resident physician
to cover the labor and delivery unit,
and all I could see was a swarm of doctors and nurses
hovering over a patient in the labor room.
They were all desperately trying to save a woman's life.
The patient was in shock.
She had delivered a healthy baby boy a few hours before I arrived.
Suddenly, she collapsed, became unresponsive,
and had profuse uterine bleeding.
By the time I got to the room,
there were multiple doctors and nurses and the patient was lifeless.
The resuscitation team tried to bring her back to life,
but despite everyone's best efforts, she died.
What I remember most about that day was the father's piercing cry.
It went through my heart and the heart of everyone on that floor.
This was supposed to be the happiest day of his life,
but instead it turned out to be the worst day.
I wish I could say this tragedy was an isolated incident,
but sadly that's not the case.
Every year in the United States, somewhere between 700 and 900 women
die from a pregnancy-related cause.
The shocking part of this story
is that our maternal mortality rate
is actually higher than all other high-income countries,
and our rates are far worse for women of color.
Our rate of maternal mortality actually increased over the last decade,
while other countries reduced their rates.
And the biggest paradox of all?
We spend more on health care than any other country in the world.
Well, around the same time in residency that this new mother lost her life,
I became a mother myself,
and even with all of my background and training in the field,
I was taken aback by how little attention
was paid to delivering high-quality maternal health care,
and I thought about what that meant, not just for myself,
but for so many other women.
Maybe it's because my dad was a civil rights attorney
and my parents were socially conscious
and demanded that we stand up for what we believe in,
or the fact that my parents were born in Jamaica,
came to the United States,
and were able to realize the American Dream.
Or maybe it was my residency training,
where I saw firsthand
how poorly so many low-income women of color
were treated by our healthcare system.
For whatever the reason, I felt a responsibility to stand up,
not just for myself,
but for all women,
and especially those marginalized by our healthcare system.
And I decided to focus my career on improving maternal health care.