Access Bridge: Elevate Reproductive Health Care in the Emergency Department

Access Bridge is a novel program that improves access to evidence-based reproductive health services and increases health equity by building the capacity of America’s emergency departments (EDs) to serve as reproductive health safety nets. You have the opportunity to support a realistic reproductive healthcare reform that will impact patients immediately and address threats clinicians face in the post-Dobbs landscape.

In a post-Dobbs era, 24 states have implemented abortion bans, leaving many emergency physicians without clear guidelines for treating pregnancy emergencies and reproductive health issues. Concurrently, there has been a growing reliance on the emergency department as the only access point for patients needing urgent or emergent reproductive health care. As this continues, we will see an increased dependence on the emergency department as the only access point for patients needing urgent or emergent reproductive health services. With your continued financial support, we will expand our work in EDs and continue to teach skills in the diagnosis and management of common pregnancy emergencies, provide information on the provision of non-coercive access to contraception and emergency contraception, and develop further partnerships for research and data collection.

We currently have new and graduated fellows working at over 40 hospitals across 23 states and are scaling rapidly. Your support will fund:

 Clinical Technical Assistance: Refine evidence-based, easily-to-read protocols for providers and act as clinical and culture change coaches for program fellows and other motivated clinicians.

Program Expansion: Support fellows in 40 states to continue to scale the program, including states with abortion restrictions we haven’t yet reached.

Research and Evidence: Collaborate with established researchers to conduct independent research to advance Access Bridge’s evidence base to advocate for change with national professional organizations.

Outreach and Awareness: Spread the use of clinical protocols by advocating that national professional organizations and staffing firms engage in spread of evidence-based protocols; Grow a trusted reputation and build name recognition by presenting findings at major national conferences.