AUGUSTA, Ga. () — Black women have played a vital role in shaping healthcare, yet their stories are often left untold. Dr. Donna Adams-Pickett, an OB-GYN in Augusta, is making sure those contributions—and the ongoing fight for health equity—are recognized.

Her journey into medicine was personal. Her grandmother died during childbirth when her father was just 12 years old. “It truly impacted his life. He was a great dad, but once he told me that story, I decided that I wanted to be there for women like his mother,” she said.

The numbers don’t lie. Black women face higher maternal mortality rates, often due to systemic disparities in healthcare. Dr. Adams-Pickett is working to change that, not just in her practice but through education and advocacy. “My sorority, Alpha Kappa Alpha, back in the 1930s had something called the Mississippi Health Project, where they went down to the Mississippi Delta every summer to address those health disparities there. And so I like to think that the work that I do is along that line in that I try to be the voice for those patients who can’t quite understand what’s happening to their bodies,” she recalled.

She points to Black women, Betsy, Lucy, and Anarcha, whose bodies were used for medical experimentation—without anesthesia. “I say I like to speak their names and not the names of the gynecologist who did those surgeries. I like to just tell individuals today, those women sacrificed their lives so that we should be, could be, healthy now. So let’s make sure they didn’t sacrifice their lives in vain,” she added.

Through her foundation, Four Girls, Dr. Adams-Pickett provides health education for underserved women and girls. She wants women to take control of their health—starting with basic screenings like Pap smears and mammograms. She says women tend to put themselves last. “In terms of having their annual healthcare screening, um, in terms of getting their Pap smears, mammograms, even doing monthly self-breast exams, those are things that women tend to not do because they aren’t provided the education on how to do it properly,” she said.

Dr. Adams-Pickett continues to sound the alarm about disparities in Black women’s healthcare. And she’s not stopping anytime soon.

For more on her work, visit Augusta Women’s Health and Wellness Center at augustawomenshealth.com.