Expertise

Global maternal health; maternal mortality; postpartum care; sub-Saharan Africa

At the Keough School

Yenupini Joyce Adams is concurrent assistant professor of the practice in the Keough School of Global Affairs.

Courses

• Women & Health in Global Context: Key Issues Across the Lifespan (elective for master of global affairs and undergraduate minor in international development studies)
• Global Safe Motherhood (elective for master of global affairs)
• Health, Culture & Society (elective for undergraduate minor in international development studies)

Biography

Adams is an assistant professor of the practice and the global maternal research lead at Notre Dame’s Eck Institute for Global Health. Before coming to Notre Dame, Adams was an assistant professor in the WellStar School of Nursing at Kennesaw State University. She earned her PhD from the College of Nursing at Michigan State University and her bachelor of science in nursing from Calvin University in Grand Rapids, Michigan. As a nurse scientist, her current research builds on her various experiences in maternal health research and her prior experience as a mother/baby nurse.

Recognitions and Awards

Adams was the recipient of the 2020 New Investigator Award by the Midwest Nursing Research Society women’s health and transitions in childbearing research interest group. She was also a recipient of the AACN/Johnson & Johnson Minority Nurse Faculty Scholars Award by the American Association of Colleges of Nursing (2013).

Research and Publications

Adams’ research addresses maternal health disparities that lead to mortality. More specifically, her research is dedicated to improving postpartum health outcomes among women most vulnerable to maternal mortality. She is highly motivated and passionate about using research interventions to improve maternal health, promote safe motherhood, and decrease maternal mortality and morbidity among vulnerable populations in the United States, and in Sub-Saharan Africa where the burden of maternal mortality is most severe. Her research is guided by and contributes to the Three Delays Model originally developed by Thaddeus and Maine (1994). As principal investigator and co-investigator on multiple projects, she has experience conducting patient focused research examining both patient and healthcare facility factors that influence access to quality postpartum care and education. She is focused on developing interventions that can be scaled-up and adopted into existing systems of care to improve maternal health, promote safe motherhood, and decrease maternal mortality and morbidity. While Adams’ research focuses mainly on access to and quality of postpartum care, she has also done work and is interested in other maternal health issues.

Read more about research projects.

Publication list

News and Blog Posts

Global maternal mortality: the dignity of life and the tragedy of death (Dignity & Development)