Black Midwifery as Medicine, Movement, and Memory

Black midwives in America did not disappear because they weren't excellent. They were displaced — by demonization, by policy, by hospital systems, by licensure structures designed to push them out. This talk traces that history and makes the case for why restoring and growing the Black midwifery workforce is not a diversity initiative. It is a clinical imperative and a justice strategy. Dr. Grayson draws on her work building a national Midwifery Model of Care at CHOICES Center for Reproductive Health and the Black Midwifery Fellowship Program in Tennessee to show what reclamation looks like in practice — and what it demands of the institutions that claim to care about equity.

Best for: academic medical centers, nursing and midwifery programs, health equity conferences, foundations and funders

Integrating Reproductive Justice Into Everyday Clinical Care

Reproductive justice is not a framework you apply after the clinical encounter. It is the encounter. This talk moves reproductive justice out of the theoretical and into the practical — examining how it reshapes intake, informed consent, care planning, and the power dynamics of every room where reproductive healthcare is delivered. Dr. Grayson draws on over fifteen years of clinical practice in a reproductive justice-centered model to show what this framework looks like when it is built into protocols, not just stated in mission statements.

Best for: clinical training programs, reproductive health organizations, health systems, advanced practice programs

How Healthcare Systems Lock Out Midwives — and Who Pays the Price

Midwifery is one of the most evidence-based models of care for low-risk pregnancy — and one of the most systematically suppressed. This talk examines the structural mechanisms that have kept midwives out of hospitals, out of insurance panels, and out of communities that need them most. It names the institutions, the policies, and the financial incentives that sustain a broken system — and makes the case for what transformation actually requires. This is not a polite conversation about scope of practice. It is a structural argument about power.

Best for: policy audiences, health systems leadership, legislative convenings, midwifery and nursing associations

Black Maternal and Infant Loss as a Structural Crisis

Dr. Grayson's entry into midwifery came through documenting the stories of Black women in Memphis who had lost infants — losses that were not isolated, but generational. This talk grounds the Black maternal and infant health crisis in that specificity. It moves from data to story and back again — refusing to let statistics stand in for the human weight of what is happening and who is responsible. It closes not with despair but with a clear-eyed account of what an evidence-based, justice-centered response actually looks like.

Best for: public health conferences, academic medical centers, community health organizations, maternal health advocacy audiences

Leading with Urgency in the Fight for Reproductive Health

This is the talk for the people who are already in the work — and are tired. For the clinicians, educators, and advocates who have watched policy erode what took decades to build and are asking how to sustain the fight. Dr. Grayson does not offer easy answers or motivational platitudes. She offers clarity — about what the stakes are, what leadership in this moment demands, and why the next generation of reproductive health providers cannot afford to wait for permission to lead. Honest, direct, and built for the long game.

Best for: keynote audiences, leadership programs, health professional associations, academic institutions description

Abortion Care, Education, and the Role of Advanced Practice Providers

Abortion is healthcare. It is also one of the most undertrained, underintegrated components of advanced practice clinical education — and that gap has consequences for patients, providers, and the future of reproductive healthcare. This talk addresses abortion care directly: the clinical, the educational, the political, and the ethical. Dr. Grayson speaks from her experience as a practicing midwife, a clinical educator, and a fellowship builder — making the case for why abortion training belongs in every advanced practice curriculum and what it takes to build the providers who will deliver it.

Best for: advanced practice nursing programs, midwifery education programs, abortion care organizations, reproductive health conferences