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OSF Healthcare Introduces Women's Health Office, Centered Around Catholic Pro-Life Teachings

Cass Herrington
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Peoria Public Radio

OSF HealthCare unveiled its new Women’s Health and Advanced Fertility Office on the North Side of Peoria Tues.

Bishop Daniel Jenky of the Catholic Diocese of Peoria led the ceremony with a blessing, followed by a sprinkling of holy water in each of the offices and examining rooms.

Credit Cass Herrington / Peoria Public Radio
/
Peoria Public Radio
Bishop Daniel Jenky blesses OSF HealthCare's Women’s Health and Advanced Fertility Office that incorporates the Catholic Church's moral teachings on contraception into its practice.

Bishop Jenky praised the new facility, calling it an extension of Saint Francis’ mission in Peoria.

“This allows women more choices, and it allows the hospital to enact its core mission to live in harmony with our Catholic faith,” Jenky said.  

The clinic does not provide services deemed immoral by the Catholic Church, like hormonal birth control or in-vitro fertilization.

Instead, OSF’s Women’s Health and Advanced Fertility Office practices the Creighton Model of family planning, which involves identifying the fertile period of a woman’s ovulatory cycle.

The doctors on staff, Dr. Jillian Stalling and Dr. Elizabeth Cox, are certified in Natural Procreative Technology, or NaPro, which is used to address underlying causes of infertility in women.

NaPro is a relatively new reproductive healthcare approach, which includes surgical procedures.

“All the services that we provide at this practice are completely in line with Catholic teaching, which actually aims to uphold the dignity of the human person and really supports the marital covenant,” Stalling said.

Some of the office’s services are exclusive to patients who are married, but Dr. Cox says the new office still welcomes unwed and same sex couples.  

“We provide gynecologic healthcare to all women,” Cox said.