Lisa Ross Birth & Women's Center - About Our Center - Staff

I knew I was to be a midwife when I started nursing school in 1981. After graduating from the University of Colorado in 1985, I worked as an RN in labor and delivery in rural North Carolina alongside a midwife who eventually delivered my two children. She taught me everything I know about really "taking care" of a woman in labor. Before entering midwifery school in 1992 at the Medical University of South Carolina, I had experienced the entire spectrum of birth from home-birth to high-risk tertiary care obstetrics.

Though the high-risk experience was invaluable, I felt that normal birth outside the hospital was where I wanted to practice as a midwife, so a freestanding birth center such as Lisa Ross Birth and Women’s Center seemed a perfect match for me as a new Certified Nurse-Midwife. I have been here since 1994, except for a one-year leave to teach midwifery students in the university setting.

I am also a Certified Lactation Consultant and am proud to boast a breastfeeding rate at our center of 94% at discharge home, and 70% at six weeks postpartum. I continue to be amazed at how much better birth unfolds when there is minimal interference with the woman’s own instincts and way of giving birth. As a midwife, I still find it an honor to be present for each and every birth and the experience will never become "routine" for me.

When I have time away from work, I enjoy my children Leif and Erik, playing the cello, reading, and visiting the ocean as often as I am able. It is important for a midwife to take time to rejuvenate herself occasionally, so she can more easily give of herself to her patients.