OB/GYN providers leaving Pueblo, health department preparing to accept more patients

PUEBLO, Colo. (KKTV) – The Pueblo Department of Public Health and Environment (PDPHE) is preparing to take in more patients as two OB/GYN providers are leaving the community.

PDPHE tells 11 News that with their departure, this cuts Pueblo County’s resources for family planning and reproductive health care in half.

So now, PDPHE is stepping in to help.

“Well, we are a trusted provider of reproductive health here in Pueblo, Colorado, and we provide STI testing, we provide birth control,” says Wendy Raso, certified nurse midwife for the Pueblo Department of Public Health and Environment.

Raso continues saying, “We have a lot of services that a lot of clinics don’t offer.

“For instance, if a patient comes to our clinic, they can have their labs tested here.

“We do blood draws on site and rapid testing, and also we have our own little pharmacy so we can dispense birth control methods such as pills, rings and we even do procedures like insertion of Nexplanon and IUDs.

“It’s very convenient for the patients.

“We even give you know a prolonged amount of birth control, like maybe a six-month or 12-month supply, so that’s so much more convenient than having to go to the pharmacy every month to pick up your pills,, and then you run the risk of being a day or two late and possibly having an unplanned pregnancy.

“We’re the team to do it. It’s our expertise, we have a great team here that’s been doing this type of work for many, many years, decades and it’s our specialty.

“And we can diagnose and treat infection same day, and start birth control same day, and it’s what we do, it’s our job.”

For years, Pueblo County has been helping women in other areas across Southern Colorado, Raso explains, saying, “We have, you know, other communities nearby who lost their OB/GYN care.

“For instance, La Junta and, you know, Walsenburg is another area that they don’t have deliveries there all the way to Raton basically, Trinidad, so Pueblo has been kind of a place for all of these other surrounding communities to come to get care, and now we’re going to be struggling for care.”

Elaborating on the challenges having limited access to an OB/GYN can present for people, Raso tells 11 News, “There are long wait times to get those appointments.

“Some people tell me it’s even six months to a year before they can get in, and what that does is it forces people to try and find other places to get care, one being the emergency room, which really isn’t an appropriate place to get that kind of care.

“And they don’t do Pap smears there, and they don’t provide preventative care there, and another place is Urgent Care, and Urgent Care is kind of the same.

“They don’t supply those types of services to patients.

“And if you have a person who needs contraception and she can’t get in for say six months, it’s possible that she can have an unplanned pregnancy and, you know, that’s life-changing.

“I always say once you get that positive pregnancy test, your life is changed forever, and sometimes for the good. sometimes making your life harder and sometimes presenting a lot of obstacles.”

In addition to unplanned pregnancies, Raso tells 11 News, “Just think about an infection like gonorrhea or chlamydia and not being able to get treatment for months, and then how many more people are going to get an infection if one goes untreated.

“So that could affect our whole community.

“The last thing we want to see is people waiting months to get treatment, or women waiting months to get on contraception.

“And I’m so happy to say that this is just a wonderful place to get care because people can call in and many times get an appointment the same day, and if not the same day, the same week.

“And they can come in, they can get tested, and they could get treatment before they walk out the door.

“I’ve worked at several places in Pueblo, and this is the easiest one to get in and get an appointment, and I love that about working here.

“If someone needs service, all they have to do is pick up the phone and call us, and we have our receptionist that will get them in right away.

“And I even frequently will see people that walk in the door without an appointment because that’s our passion here, and our reason here is to provide those services to the people that need them.

“We don’t turn anybody away, and we have a special program for people that don’t have insurance coverage, and we have contracts with several of the private insurance companies too.

“But we try to remove the barriers to access to care here and make it really easy for patients to be seen.”

As far as the type of care they provide, Raso tells 11 News, “So one of the things that we really want to achieve here is to make a comfortable environment for people to come in, to be able to talk about issues that are private and personal, and know that they are going to be confidential, that they’re not going to be judged here, that this is the kind of work that we do every day.

“And we’ve heard a lot of stories, and you know we are here to take care of people’s sexual health needs.

“My goal as a provider is to make sure that people have satisfied sex lives with none of the negative consequences.”

PDPHE has not told us yet which OB/GYN providers are leaving Pueblo, but we’ll update you as soon as we know.

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