Melissa Gilliam, MD, MPH, is the Ellen H. Block Professor in Health Justice in the Departments of Obstetrics and Gynecology and Pediatrics, chief of the Section of Family Planning and Contraceptive Research, and dean for diversity and inclusion in the Biological Sciences Division. (Robert Kozloff/The University of Chicago)
Melissa Gilliam, MD, MPH, first started to see the bigger ecosystem of teen pregnancy during a study on ways to reduce the number of teens who become pregnant again within a year of delivery. At the time a resident in obstetrics and gynecology at Northwestern Memorial Hospital, she worked on a small trial testing an intervention to remind teenage African American mothers to take their birth control pills.
“I followed the girls longitudinally and learned very quickly that their social needs, like paying their electric bill, finding child care, attending school and finding transportation proved more powerful than the intervention and made …