Bio
Safyer McKenzie-Sampson is an IDEAL Provostial Fellow and instructor within the Department of Pediatrics at Stanford University. Dr. McKenzie-Sampson is a social and perinatal epidemiologist, focused on researching the multi-level impacts of exposure to racism across the life course on the risk of adverse perinatal outcomes in Black communities, with the goal of translating findings into interventions to increase birth justice. Her research portfolio uniquely interrogates the rates of adverse perinatal outcomes through the lens of maternal nativity in the United States which allows for focus on the experiences of Black immigrants. She is currently the principal investigator of the AZANIA study, a mixed methods pilot study which collects data on the pregnancy and childbirth experiences of African immigrants in California. Dr. McKenzie-Sampson received her PhD in Epidemiology and Translational Science from the University of California San Francisco, and in addition to her research, she supports families in the Bay Area as a full-spectrum community doula.