2000, 158 pp., 2 illus., appendix
Photo: Ciel Benedetto (center) with Dolores Huerta and Gloria Steinem. 1992. Photograph by Annie Valva.
Women's Health Center, 1985-2000
For the complete text [PDF] of Ciel Benedetto: A History of the Women's Health Center, 1985-2000
Assistant Editor Irene Reti conducted two interviews with Benedetto
and coedited the volume with Project Director Randall Jarrell.
Santa Cruz Women's Health Center
(SCWHC) director Benedetto traces
the evolution of this unique community institution,
now celebrating its 25th anniversary.
Founded in 1974 as a pioneering, feminist health
collective, SCWHC is now a thriving
health organization operating in today's complex
managed care environment. Benedetto
has guided the center through this transition,
maintaining its feminist perspective
while overseeing an annual budget of more than $1
million.
SCWHC is one of the country's few remaining
women's health centers and now provides
more than 8,000 patient visits annually in general
medicine, gynecology, prenatal
care, family planning, and pediatrics. The agency also
provides information and referral
services, low-cost acupuncture, free mental health
and nutritional counseling, and
health and HIV education.
Benedetto begins her commentary with a discussion
of the agency's socialist-feminist
political origins as a collective and its commitment
to consensus decision making.
This phase eventually gave way to a more traditional
organizational structure as
the agency matured.
Benedetto details the agency's myriad activities,
including its highly developed
volunteer training program, which has produced a
remarkable number of alumni over
the years who have become agents of change as
physicians, health care providers,
and women's rights advocates.
Among the other activities of the center are the
production of its internationally
distributed newsletter and health education
materials; the provision of new contraceptive
methods such as the cervical cap; and its
participation in breast cancer research
studies. SCWHC has maintained its commitment to
diversity in its staff and patient
population over the years and has a singular
reputation among international health
agencies for women and children.