Authors
Diana Taylor: Lead Author, 1st & 2nd Editions, APC Toolkit, 2009, 2018
Dr. Taylor, nurse practitioner, educator and women’s health researcher, is Professor Emerita at the University of California-San Francisco (UCSF) School of Nursing and senior faculty in the Advancing New Standards in Reproductive Health (ANSIRH) Program, a collaborative research group and think tank at the University of California, San Francisco. Formerly, she was the Director of UCSF’s Women’s Health NP Program, as well as the co-Director of the UCSF Center for Collaborative Primary Care to advance interprofessional collaboration and innovation related to primary care education, practice and research. Dr. Taylor received her BSN from the University of Oregon, her MS from UCSF, and PhD from the University of Washington; she has hundreds of scientific articles and publications in the area of women’s health.
Dr. Taylor has been a leader in policy-shaping activities for multiple professional groups on regional, national, and international levels. With over 50 years of experience in providing women’s health care and training health professionals, Dr. Taylor has been at the forefront of developing standards and scope of practice for advanced practice nurses, serving on national committees of the American Nurses Association, the National Organization of NP Faculties, the Association of Women’s Health Nurses, the American Academy of Nursing, the Association of Reproductive Health Professionals, Nursing Students for Sexual & Reproductive Health (SRH), as well as state and local nursing practice, education, and legislative committees (ANA-California and California Association of NPs). Dr. Taylor was on the Leadership Team for RhN development (to build nursing capacity in SRH/abortion care), leader for policy advocacy (SRH access, rights, justice: where nursing stands) to oppose political interference in SRH practice, research and professional education, and founding Board chair (as well as a practicing clinician) of the San Francisco Women’s Community Clinic. Dr. Taylor has also served in leadership roles on scientific policy panels for the IOM/NAS Board on Children & Families, the IOM Safety of Silicone Breast Implants Committee, and technical committees of the World Health Organization.
Dr. Taylor has collaborated on practice-based scholarship, policies and new practice models for unintended pregnancy prevention (Evidence to inform policy, practice and education for unintended pregnancy prevention and management, JOGNN 2011) as well as co-author of a technical report on policy options for advancing the reproductive health workforce (Nurse practitioners and sexual and reproductive health services: an analysis of supply and demand, RAND Health, 2012). From 2004-2014, she led a ground-breaking study and statewide project to train and evaluate the safety of advanced practice clinicians in first trimester abortion care using a standardized curriculum with the goal to increase the number abortion providers and make professional and practice improvements to normalize abortion into women’s primary care.
Among her many rewards and honors for the advancement of clinical practice and research, Dr. Taylor has received the Loretta Ford Nurse Practitioner Advancement Award, the Achievement in Research Award from the National Organization of Nurse Practitioner Faculties, the Wisdom Keeper Award from the Society for Menstrual Cycle Research, the Women Making History Award from the SF Board of Supervisors and the Commission on the Status of Women, and the first Clinicians for Choice Leadership Award. Dr. Taylor has been awarded a fellowship from the Rockefeller Foundation in 1996 for a residency at its Bellagio Center in Italy and a fellowship in the American Academy of Nursing in 1992 where she served on the Academy’s Women’s Health Expert Panel as co-chair (2013-2019).
Read her full profile on promoting and protecting women’s health here [https://nursing.ucsf.edu/scienceofcaring/news/womens-health-care-warrior (11/7/2013)]
Barbara Safriet: Co-Author, 1st & 2nd Editions, APC Toolkit, 2009, 2018
Barbara J. Safriet (1947-2025) was a dear friend to many and consultant to the ANSIRH Program at UCSF during the creation of the Toolkit's First Edition and Second Edition updates.
She taught Health Law and Policy at Yale Law School and Lewis and Clark Law School and lectured and published extensively on the regulation of health care providers, with a special focus on scope of practice. Professor Safriet served as a member of The Pew Health Professions Commission, and its Taskforce on Health Care Workforce Regulation, and as a Health Law Consultant and Presenter for the Rockefeller Foundation, the W. K. Kellogg Foundation, the Commonwealth Fund, the Association of Academic Health Centers, the U.S. Agency for Health Care Policy and Research, the U.S. Public Health Service, the National Rural Health Association, the National Council of State Legislatures, and the Office of Technology Assessment of the U.S. Congress.
Professor Safriet became known to nursing and midwifery in the 1980s when she was an advisor to the Oregon Nurses Association on legislation authorizing nurse practitioner practice and prescribing authority. She has published and lectured extensively on topics of administrative and constitutional law, issues of health care professionals’ licensure and regulation and health workforce problems
In 1997, she served on a national interdisciplinary symposium establishing policy recommendations for establishing NPs, CNMs and PAs as qualified abortion services providers. In the 20 years since this group issued its report, the lack of abortion providers persists due to the explosive combination of the politics of abortion and politics of health professional regulation. Professor Safriet persevered in providing leadership to establish state-based strategies combining regulation of scope of practice and abortion care with the goal to decrease the exceptionalism of abortion regulations that restrict women’s access to qualified clinicians as well as to treat abortion care in the same way other types of practice are regulated (e.g., educational preparation, standards, and competency).
Among several areas of extraordinary service, legitimizing our work in abortion and health care, is exemplified by a project that spanned more than 20 years—Professor Safriet provided sustained leadership to national groups advocating for improved access to abortion services by reducing regulatory barriers. Collaborating across professions to solve this most complex of workforce problems, Barbara always made time to address the most difficult, wicked problems. She challenged us to be better, as clinicians and patient advocates—to implement the ethics of care in the face of personal dilemmas. In 1995, Barbara served on a national symposium convened by national reproductive rights advocates on strategies to expand and improve the abortion care workforce. Since this group issued its report, the lack of abortion providers persists due to the explosive combination of the politics of abortion and politics of health professional regulation. Professor Safriet persevered in providing leadership to establish state-based strategies combining regulation of scope of practice and abortion care with the goal to decrease the exceptionalism of abortion regulations that restrict women’s access to qualified clinicians as well as to treat abortion care in the same way other types of practice are regulated (e.g., educational preparation, standards, and competency). Up until her death in 2025, Safriet maintained her commitment to removing unjustified barriers to abortion practice that limit women’s access to safe, quality services. Her contributions are both broad and deep including a professional “toolkit” for clinicians and policy makers, policy briefs on ‘why scope of practice matters to reproductive health’, commentary on how ‘politics trumps science’ in the area of abortion care, and serving as a consultant to an interprofessional policy center at UCSF ANSIRH. Barbara Safriet’s extraordinary contributions in the area of reproductive health workforce can be exemplified as “legitimizing our work” by her thoughtful and considered writings and her articulate perspectives. She was an extraordinary spokeswoman for patients in need and for the clinicians who serve them.
Beth Kruse, MS, CNM, ARNP: Co-Author, 1st Edition APC Toolkit, 2009
Beth Kruse is a certified nurse midwife who has been dedicated to improving sexual and reproductive health care for over 40 years.
Beth’s dedication to advancing the practice of qualified nurse practitioners, midwives and physician assistants as legal providers of abortion has a long history. As a key investigator in the early Population Council research on mifepristone abortion in the US, Beth was one of the first US health care providers to be trained in medical abortion (both mifepristone and methotrexate), and subsequently served as faculty for trainings and at professional meetings both in the US and abroad.
From 2005-2012 Beth was the Associate Director of Clinical Services for the National Abortion Federation. Along with a variety of teaching, writing, and editing projects, she co-authored the chapter on quality abortion care in the 2009 NAF textbook, Management of Unintended and Abnormal Pregnancy. During this time, Beth also served on the Data and Clinical Safety Monitoring Committee of the Health Workforce Pilot Project in California, the groundbreaking initiative which resulted in the first contemporary state law specifically recognizing qualified nurse practitioners, midwives and physician assistants as legal providers of aspiration abortion.
As an expert clinician, Beth served for many years as Lead Clinician for the Public Health- Seattle & King County Family Planning Program. Following the decriminalization of abortion in Mexico City, Beth spent several years developing and implementing NAF’s Quality Assurance program for first trimester abortion practice, and served as expert consultant in quality abortion care to the Ministry of Health’s 11 public hospitals and several independent clinics.
Beth has served both in expert advisory capacity and as faculty for professional meetings on abortion-related topics for organizations such as the Population Council, Ipas, the Mexico City Ministry of Health, the Association of Reproductive Health Professionals, the International Congress of Midwives, and the American College of Nurse Midwives.
Grayson Dempsey: Co-Author, 1st Edition APC Toolkit, 2009
Grayson Dempsey has worked as an advocate for reproductive rights, health and equity since 1999. She was the founder of Backline (now All-Options), an organization that uses direct service and social change strategies to promote unconditional, judgment-free support for people in all of their decisions, feelings, and experiences with pregnancy, parenting, abortion, and adoption. Ms. Dempsey served as the Executive Director of NARAL Pro-Choice Oregon, and in 2017 was member of the steering committee that developed and championed the Reproductive Health Equity Act, which has been hailed as the most progressive piece of reproductive healthcare policy in the nation. Ms. Dempsey served as a consultant to the Abortion Access Project (now Provide) during which time she coordinated efforts in the state of Oregon that led to the first explicit regulatory opinion on early abortion care and nurse practitioner scope of practice.
Lisa Summers: Co-Author, 2nd Edition AP Toolkit, 2018
Lisa brings many years of experience as a nurse, midwife, educator and policy analyst to her role as co-author in the Toolkit’s second edition. Lisa practiced clinically as a nurse and then a nurse-midwife for over 20 years before shifting to policy work. A 1983 graduate of Yale School of Nursing, she practiced in large midwifery services and in private practice. She served on faculties of nurse-midwifery education programs at Baylor and Columbia, and medical school faculties at the University of Texas and Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, developing a profound appreciation for the potential of interdisciplinary education.
Lisa’s entrée to association work came in 1997 when she joined the staff at the American College of Nurse-Midwives (ACNM). In 11 years there, ultimately as Director of Professional Services, she provided consultation on a range of issues from policy and strategy for malpractice insurance and reimbursement, to clinical topics and scope of practice. Lisa subsequently held policy positions at National Partnership for Patients & Families and at the American Nurses Association (ANA) as health system reform was debated and the Affordable Care Act was passed and implemented. She also served as Director of Policy & Advocacy at Centering Healthcare Institute. In six years at the ANA, she focused on health system reform and the role of advanced practice nursing.
In 2010, Lisa began returning to Yale School of Nursing (YSN) to teach health policy. In January 2017, she served as Deputy Director in the Doctor of Nursing Practice program. She holds a doctoral degree in Sociomedical Sciences from Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health. She was elected to Fellowship in the ACNM in 2006 and was chosen as one of “90 Yale Nurses” honored on the 90th anniversary of YSN in 2013.