(CBN News) Pro-life pregnancy centers are known for offering ultrasounds, diapers, and other help to women in crisis pregnancies. Recently, a growing number of these centers have expanded their services to include primary medical care.
The move to include medical services has been underway for years and began gaining traction after the fall of Roe v. Wade. It helps pregnancy centers expand the pro-life message that the lives of babies and women matter.
"We have more than 75 percent of the pregnancy centers across the nation actually doing ultrasound and other medical services," said Jor-El Godsey, president of Heartbeat International. "So, this has been something that's been building for the last 30-plus years."
Godsey told CBN News, "As our country becomes more a landscape of life states and abortion states, the idea that abortion is not supposed to be happening in some of our states, but women are still faced with challenging decisions, and we want to bring positive life-affirming healthcare to them."
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Alternatives Pregnancy Center in Sacramento, CA, serves as one example.
In the last few years, the clinic has added family practice doctors, a radiologist, and a specialist in high-risk pregnancies. Nurses and medical assistants are also on staff.
Executive Director Heidi Matzke said in an interview with CBN that the center is the only health provider for some patients.
"When women come to us for whatever reason, they don't have health insurance at the time, all of our services here are free," explained Matzke. "We offer everything from pregnancy tests to STD testing, to vaginal exams, to well-woman visits, to prenatal care."
Alternatives also offers abortion pill reversal services as well as helping women seeking to detransition – something Matzke was approached about after speaking at a church service.
"I had this, what appeared to be a man, come up to me and asked me if I would see someone like him, and obviously a little nervous in that conversation. But what he began to explain was that he was actually a she, and she was born biologically female, spent six years transitioning, found Jesus Christ as a personal savior and was abandoned by her doctors in the de-transitioning process."
A staff doctor at Alternatives just happened to specialize in hormone therapy.
"She said, 'Would your doctor see someone like me?' And I just find it fascinating that God named our clinic Alternatives Pregnancy Center, and who would've ever dreamed that He would use this pregnancy clinic in a situation like that," Matzke said.
With Planned Parenthood clinics shutting down, nationwide pregnancy centers aim to not only compete with but even transcend the longtime abortion provider.
"As we're seeing in their collapse, most of their business model was centered around the abortion and like care, that's why we're seeing them close in both life states and abortion states," said Godsey. "But we're really seeing them move their model online, which is less about care for the woman and more about care for their bottom line. Meanwhile, pregnancy centers are motivated because they want to serve women, they want to love on women and help them."
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Editor's note: This article was published by CBN News and is reprinted with permission.
