Denese Kellier is a graduate student pursuing her MPH in Maternal and Child Health (MCH) at Florida International University Robert Stempel College of Public Health and Social Work. Before beginning her MPH program, she earned her Bachelor’s in Biomedical Sciences. Denese currently serves as Maternal Research Collaborative Fellow with the Maternal Health Research Collaborative (MHRC), where she trains and develops research skills through partnerships with Morgan State University and the Kennedy Krieger Institute. Denese’s MCH interests include maternal mortality in Black communities, and she is currently studying breastfeeding uptake in the MCH population. Denese is passionate about bringing others into the public health field, and she aspires to become an OB/GYN, approaching patient care from a thoughtful and holistic perspective.
The MCH Field Needs Us: How Self-Reflection Activates MCH Leadership
About You
What is your Maternal and Child Health (MCH) focus area?
My MCH focus area is in maternal mortality, specifically in supporting Black communities in Palm Beach, Florida. Palm Beach is my hometown; hence, I am interested in learning about the landscape and context of my area. For my fellowship program, we are assessing social determinants of health in relation to breastfeeding behaviors.
What do you want other MCH students to know about this particular issue within our field?
I want other MCH students to know that maternal mortality rates in the United States are increasing, and how the history of structural and medical racism continues to influence this public health issue.
What sparked your interest in MCH?
What sparked my interest in MCH was my past experience in the medical field as a Black woman and feelings of being ignored during checkups. This ignited my dream to become an OB/GYN and treat my patients better than I was treated. During my time in my MPH program at FIU, conducting my own research opened my eyes to the deeper issue of inadequate obstetric and gynecologic care and deaths in the Black maternal community.
Why is it important for you to explore MCH (versus other disciplines or areas of public health)?
I believe it is important to explore the MCH field because of the various aspects that can be researched. MCH covers the entire life of a woman from birth, youth, pre- and perinatal care, pregnancy and postpartum care. I enjoy that it is a specific field that brings attention to maternal health issues that could otherwise be ignored in the grand scheme of medicine.
How would you describe yourself?
I describe myself as quiet, thoughtful, and introspective.
Project or Practicum Experience
Describe a specific project, practicum or internship you participated in. What was your role and what did you work on?
I am currently transitioning into my second year as a Maternal Research Collaborative Fellow (MHRC) through Morgan State University (MSU) and Florida International University (FIU). As a research fellow, I attend workshops hosted by MSU and the Kennedy Krieger Institute to learn STATA coding, how to analyze research articles to complete literature reviews, and to learn more about selected MCH topics like maternal mortality and how to reduce maternal healthcare discrimination. I am also engaged in one-on-one data analysis and manuscript development with mentors at FIU.
Which MCH Leadership Competency (or competencies) most connects to this work? What were key outcomes or impacts from your project—on the community, organization/agency or yourself?
I chose to reflect on Competency 2, Self Reflection, which includes “identifying personal strengths in both informal and organizational contexts”. Some of my best personal strengths include my curiosity and my ability to listen to other’s viewpoints, even if I may not agree. I am supporting a mentor with a manuscript assessing the social determinants of health associated with breastfeeding behaviors as part of my research. The key goals of this project were to: 1) educate the population about the importance of breastfeeding for both mother and baby and 2) analyze components with strongest associations with increasing breastfeeding behaviors.
As a public health student, I know that those of Black race, foreign nativity and low socioeconomic status have lower rates of breastfeeding initiation and sustainment. This raises the questions, ‘Why is this the case?’ and ‘What can be done to increase these breastfeeding rates within these populations?’ When I discussed these questions with my mentor, we decided that these are important questions but ultimately not what our current paper is focused on. The discussions we had reflected on the gaps in current research about assistive social groups for both fathers and other family members, as our research revealed that babies in large family sizes (4+ people) and born to parents with fathers that have good mental health increased the odds of breastfeeding. Potential causal factors and interventions are topics that we can research in the future, but if I had never thought about these things or discussed them, they may have been overlooked.
After completing our research, I understood that there are factors present in a mother’s life that can decrease the ability and desire to breastfeed, and that social and community support and government organized systems can increase the mother’s desire to breastfeed. These outcomes reinforced that public health focuses on community education, but education also requires action to achieve uptake of healthy behaviors and wellness in target populations. I believe that programs should be created to support mothers as they apply the education they receive from healthcare practitioners to better their own health and the health of their children.
Reflection and Growth
Explore the role of self-reflection in your growth as an MCH professional. How has reflecting on your learnings or experiences helped you align your career goals with the MCH competency/competencies you previously mentioned?
Reflecting on my MCH professional growth has allowed me to see the skills I have developed throughout my degree, like public speaking, literature searches and creating annotated bibliographies. These skills help me think critically about policies such as how one’s built environment mediates access to care or enhanced perinatal access to midwife and doula support. My academic and professional experiences have placed me in circumstances that showed how my strong curiosity and introspection can contribute significantly to MCH research. With these skills, I hope to explore various topics: Black maternal care quality and access, the impact of previous health issues versus new arising maternal health issues, and potential causes of endometriosis. Knowing my strengths has given me more confidence to engage with other MCH professionals and classmates, to learn about topics that interest me, and to share MCH information with my family and friends.
How do you define leadership in MCH, and what kind of leader do you hope to be?
I define leadership in MCH as a purposeful direction for the benefit of the MCH community. I think it is important to ensure that proper policies and health promotion plans are carried out while also recognizing that it takes teamwork to make this happen efficiently. I hope to be a leader that listens to others and can consider and analyze all suggestions that are brought to me.
Please reflect on your experience as an MCH student. How do your academics influence your field/practice-based experiences (and vice versa)?
As a graduate student, it is important for me to remember that I am smarter than I think sometimes and I need to continue to build my confidence when sharing knowledge. My academics have influenced my fellowship work because I am using content and concepts I’ve learned in class to real life research. Becoming an MCH professional requires lifelong commitment to learning and desire to contribute thoughtful and community-focused research to the field. Approaching classes and field-based experiences with this level of care can strengthen the past MCH systems put in place and make them more beneficial to all MCH communities.
What is one insight you want to share with a prospective student considering joining the MCH field within public health at large?
You are as intelligent as you believe yourself to be. You are going into public health for a reason, you got accepted into your program(s) for a reason, everything happens for a reason. You are made to be a part of making the public health field better.
