Program Description:

Developed in partnership between the AMSA Reproductive Health Project and the RJ Med Ed Project of the University of Michigan Medical School, this virtual elective for U.S. and international medical students (in particular, medical students pursuing family medicine or ob/gyn) will center Reproductive Justice (RJ) as a human-rights framework for exploring topics related to reproductive health and abortion care, including approaches to RJ-informed and trauma-informed patient care. The course will present reproductive health education with a focus on the interconnections of power, privilege, oppression, and resistance. Students will engage with critical social theories – including Critical Race Theory, Intersectional Feminism, and Queer Theory – to explore, interrogate, and reflect on the complex sociocultural, medico-legal, and politico-economic context of sexual and reproductive health.

The program is grounded in a pedagogy of liberatory education (Paulo Freire; bell hooks), and in a commitment to practicing an ethics of Love-centered educational care for adult learners that help us create and sustain deeper relationships within intentional communities.

This course will cover healthcare delivery including family planning and abortion care in a post-Roe reality. Even though this is a non-clinical elective, we will significantly incorporate approaches to patient care that are loving and affirmative of the universal human right to bodily autonomy, agency, and dignity, with a focus on correcting and repairing medicine’s ethical failures to honor the bodily autonomy, agency, and dignity of women and femme people generally, and especially Indigenous and Black women, and queer and trans people.

AMSA Reproductive Health Institute 2023 

We are excited to share we’ve designed a new format that features monthly live and on-demand sessions, advocacy & clinical skills-building, one-on-one mentoring and coaching, along with on-site special networking and action opportunities at AMSACon 2023 in Phoenix, AZ.

Applications are now closed

Check out our post in AMSA ON CALL:

Calling Repro Freedom Dreamers & Doers!

The “WHY”

The late civil rights activist, Toni Cade Bambara, once said, “The role of the artist is to make the revolution irresistible.”  At a time when authoritarian and fascist movements in the US are organizing to reverse more than 60 years of gains in human and civil rights, we – those of us on the side of freedom, truth, and beauty – must present a compelling and irresistible vision for collective liberation, freedom, and flourishing. Too often, the side of freedom fails to convey what we are actually for, because we speak so frequently about what we are against. But merely speaking against things does not a movement make! At least, not one that is grounded in joyful community, embodied connection, and deep resolve to keep fighting for what is right and good.

This year’s Abortion Care & Reproductive Health Institute will help future physicians lead with positive values that point to a better world for us all. The Institute will be an exploration of what it means to say that “hope is not a feeling, it is a discipline” in light of the very serious and harmful attacks against reproductive health, rights, and justice that we are experiencing in the US — including the egregious reversal of the constitutional protection to the right to abortion care. For as much as it is necessary to boldly step up and say “No!” to these ongoing attacks, it is equally necessary that we tell and embody a counternarrative that invites and draws people into the vital and creative work of building the world we actually dream of.

So, if you are a future physician who is also a Reproductive Freedom Dreamer and Doer, this Institute might be for you!
READ MORE…

These Medical Ethics in Reproductive Health Teach-Ins are designed to engage medical students in the difficult and necessary conversations and analyses of historical and present-day reproductive injustices and ethical failures, taking a close look at these instances not merely for their historical significance, but even more importantly, for their relevance to our current context of institutional and systemic racism, sexism, and classism. Utilizing critical lenses based in the lived experiences of those who as individuals and communities have been the targets and victims of sexual and reproductive health abuse, control, violence, and dehumanization.

Spring 2024 – Medical Ethics in Reproductive Health Teach-In

Bodily Autonomy, Reproductive Destiny, and Anti-abortion Policy
– Live sessions start at 8:00pmET on March 11, April 15, May 13, 2024

Stay Tuned for More! Upcoming Teach-Ins will explore:

• Conscientious Provision – the Moral & Ethical Case for Abortion Care as a Social Good
• Physicians as Enforcers – Pregnancy Criminalization & Physician Reporting
• Biopower, Stratified Reproduction, & the Questions of Whose Lives Matter and How Much

Sign up Here  for updates on future offerings

AMSA Reproductive Health Scholars Program
Spring 2024 – Registration Closed

AMSA strives to empower physicians-in-training to effect change through education and advocacy. AMSA Scholars Programs are designed to provide medical and premed students with information not covered in traditional medical school curriculum and to foster an online learning community of future physicians.

The AMSA Reproductive Health Scholars Program addresses the “hidden curriculum” in medical school and prepare students to think critically about abortion-related and education and training opportunities. At the end of the program, participants develop a project utilizing the knowledge gained from the course. The projects are an application of their new skills, as well as a professional development opportunity in the participant’s school or community. Throughout the experience, participants gain valuable mentorship from their Course Directors, fellow Scholars, and partner organizations to enhance their projects.

Note: Students attending an international medical schools who are either U.S. citizens or intend to practice in the US may register with the understanding our program focus is on U.S. abortion policy and practice and is not designed to address policy or practice outside the U.S.

Learn More

Winter/Spring 2024  Schedule –  January 18, 2024 – April 25, 2024
Bi-monthly sessions on Thursdays from 7:00-8:00pm ET

Topics this program addresses:

• Diversity & Equity in Abortion Access & Our Healthcare Workforce
• Basic Clinical Overview of First & Second Trimester Abortion
• Protecting Reproductive Health: State & Federal Laws that Impact Access & Care
• Reproductive Justice: Framework & Advocacy
• Options Counseling & Values Clarification in Reproductive Care
• Birth Settings in America: Outcomes, Quality, Access, & Choice
• When Routine Training is Unethical & Becomes Illegal: The Case of Intimate Exams for Teaching Purposes

For more information please email rhp@amsa.org