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About Us

What we do

Grow Midwives® works on building relationships and educating physicians, hospitals, and midwives about best practices in collaborative care experiences. A variety of care models, in a variety of settings, can be implemented with our expert assistance.

Meet the team

Ginger Breedlove, PhD, CNM,
FACNM, FAAN

CEO, Founder and Principal Consultant

Solving the shortage of women’s health care providers in the US is a daunting task that will involve coordinating stakeholders from every level of the medical community. There are few people in the world today who understand this complex issue as well as Ginger Breedlove, PhD, CNM, APRN, FACNM, FAAN.

Recipient of ACNM's Hattie Hemschemeyer Award 2020

This award honors a midwife for continuous outstanding contributions or distinguished service to midwifery and/or maternal and child health (MCH), or contributions of historical significance to the development and advancement of midwifery, ACNM, or MCH

Lesley Rathbun, MSN, CNM,
FNP, FACNM

CCO, Co-Founder and Senior Consultant

The main job of any OBGYN or Midwife is to ensure the health of mothers and babies, but birth in the United States is still a business. Lesley Rathbun has spent the last 30 years advocating for women’s health while becoming a well-known figure in the fields of birth center entrepreneurship and legislation.

Arden Schwenker, CPCO

Chief Financial Officer and Senior Consultant

Arden has spent over a decade in the healthcare industry with a primary focus on midwifery and birth centers. Before joining Grow Midwives, she was the Director of Operations and Chief Compliance Officer for a medical billing service. Arden has extensive experience in medical billing and coding, revenue cycle management, health care compliance and contract negotiations.

Joseph Booth, JD,
Mdiv., FAAML

Chief Legal Counsel

Today’s Physicians and Midwives spend the majority of their early careers learning how to administer care. So much so that learning the legal and business aspects of running a practice simply isn’t feasible. The legalities surrounding maternity care require careful navigation by a knowledgeable advocate.

At Grow Midwives®, we offer contract reviews. The review can include comments and insights from Joseph W. Booth, who is an attorney licensed to practice law in Kansas and Missouri only, and Ginger Breedlove PhD, CNM, FACNM, FAAN. While we can share our general experience and scholastic knowledge, neither Grow Midwives nor Joseph W. Booth can offer you legal advice. We cannot stand in a legal representational role or provide legal advice. By agreeing to go forward any such any interaction between Grow Midwives® involving Mr. Booth does not create an attorney-client relationship and will not present a conflict in any future relationship.

John D. Yeast, MD, MFM, MSPH

Physician Consultant

Dr. Yeast first practiced alongside midwives in the military and became very supportive of their caring, high quality practices. Then, while spending 34 years as Director of a Perinatal Center in Kansas City in the early 1990's, John and his MFM colleagues (each having worked with CNMs in their career) assisted in opening the first hospital-based midwifery practice in the region. Ginger Breedlove was hired to start and direct this highly successful midwifery practice. Being able to consult with a physician like Dr. Yeast, who has worked alongside midwives and understands day to day collaborative care, can help new start-ups reduce potential pitfalls and design models that bring sustainability and success.

Denise Fryzelka, PhD, CNM, APNP

Consultant

Being a midwife takes tenacity, courage and advocacy for those they care for, those they educate, as well as for themselves. No one is more aware of the challenges and the opportunities these present than Denise Fryzelka, CNM, PhD, who has over 25 years of experience providing midwifery care, education, and partnerships across many models of care. She has practiced in diverse roles and settings, including birth centers and hospitals, such as Haiti, Guatemala, Europe, and the United States. Dr. Fryzelka brings a unique blend of practice and evidence-based consulting, strategies, and coaching to Grow Midwives®, as well as centralizing diversity, equity and inclusion by providing not only tools for caring for diverse populations, but also equity-minded frameworks and action-based results.

Kelly Fritz, MSN, CNM

Projects Coordinator and Consultant

From a strong belief that women’s health is best served in wellness focused and women centered settings and knowing that midwifery is a strong pathway to achieve that, Kelly is excited to join Grow Midwives! Her professional experience, since 1985, includes inpatient postpartum and nursery nurse, prenatal exercise and childbirth education instructor, Master’s- Clinical Nurse Specialist with emphases in Women’s Health and Community Health, breastfeeding peer support program developer, Registered Nurse at Topeka, KS freestanding birth center, Nurse Educator in first nurse midwifery practice in Greater Kansas City, Childbirth Educator trainer, CNM with over 8 years’ experience in freestanding birth centers and in hospital, private practice ob/gyn practice, graduate faculty in university nursing and midwifery programs, and ongoing public health advocacy and women’s health volunteerism.

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