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Planned Parenthood to expand reproductive care in rural Missouri with Rolla clinic

Planned Parenthood will take over the former Tri-Rivers Family Planning center in Rolla in November.
Jonathan Ahl
Planned Parenthood will take over the former Tri-Rivers Family Planning center in Rolla in November.
Dr. Colleen McNicholas is the chief medical officer of Planned Parenthood of the St. Louis Region & Southwest Missouri.
Miya Norfleet
Dr. Colleen McNicholas is the chief medical officer of Planned Parenthood of the St. Louis Region & Southwest Missouri.

Planned Parenthood will take over the former Tri-Rivers Family Planning center in Rolla starting Tuesday.

“In this moment where we know that Missouri continues to attack reproductive rights, Planned Parenthood is more eager than ever to show that we are here to stay, and that we are going to expand whatever services that we can to the folks in Missouri and rural America,” Dr. Colleen McNicholas told St. Louis on the Air.

The chief medical officer of Planned Parenthood of the St. Louis Region & Southwest Missouri said the health center will offer contraceptives, pregnancy tests and other reproductive health services to residents throughout Missouri. She added that it’s especially important to offer these services in a state that bans abortions.

“Now, more than ever, it is so important that we’re also thinking about preventative care, primary care, contraceptive care — being able to give patients across Missouri the tools to be healthy to plan pregnancies and to prevent pregnancies when they don’t want them,” McNicholas said.

Hailey Kramer was a nurse practitioner at Tri-Rivers before it announced it was closing after about 50 years of operation, and she will stay on at the clinic once Planned Parenthood opens.

She said her patients were happy to hear they would have access again because the health center serves more than just Rolla residents.

“We have people from very far rural areas that don’t have any access to the care that they need where they are, that come from an hour and half [to] hours [and] even further away just to get their birth control with us.”

St. Louis on the Air” brings you the stories of St. Louis and the people who live, work and create in our region. The show is produced by Miya Norfleet, Emily Woodbury, Danny Wicentowski and Alex Heuer. Avery Rogers is our production assistant. The audio engineer is Aaron Doerr.

Copyright 2022 St. Louis Public Radio. To see more, visit St. Louis Public Radio.

Planned Parenthood to expand reproductive care in rural Missouri with Rolla clinic

Emily Woodbury joined the St. Louis on the Air team in July 2019. Prior to that, she worked at Iowa Public Radio as a producer for two daily, statewide talk programs. She is a graduate of the University of Iowa with a degree in journalism and a minor in political science. She got her start in news radio by working at her college radio station as a news director. Emily enjoys playing roller derby, working with dogs, and playing games – both video and tabletop.
Marissanne Lewis-Thompson joined St. Louis Public Radio October 2017 as the afternoon newscaster and as a general assignment reporter. She previously spent time as a feature reporter at KRCU in Cape Girardeau, where she covered a wide variety of stories including historic floods, the Bootheel, education and homelessness. In May 2015, she graduated from the University of Missouri with a Bachelor of Journalism degree in Convergence Journalism. She's a proud Kansas City, Missouri native, where she grew up watching a ton of documentaries on PBS, which inspired her to tell stories. In her free time, she enjoys binge watching documentaries and anime. She may or may not have a problem.