This Clinic on Wheels is Saving Lives in Maternity Care Deserts
How a retrofitted bus is making a big difference in Florida
Thousands of Florida women live in maternity care deserts as hospitals across Florida are suspending obstetric care due to a lack of funding.
To help close this gap, the University of Florida launched the OB/GYN Mobile Outreach Clinic, which offers prenatal and postpartum care, breastfeeding support, family planning, annual exams, and preventive screenings.
This innovative approach is helping expand access to care, bringing essential maternal health services directly to communities that have been left without options.
The OB/GYN Mobile Outreach Clinic is a free service, with the retrofitted bus equipped with two exam rooms, an ultrasound machine, and lab testing supplies for prenatal care. It meets patients where they already are, setting up at familiar community spaces like family resource centers, churches, and public libraries.
The clinic was launched in February 2025, and by the end of 2025, they had provided essential care to 194 women in 616 visits.
This problem isn’t unique to Florida. Around 2.5 million U.S. women of childbearing age live in maternity care deserts—counties without a hospital, birthing center, or OB provider. Over the past decade, hundreds of obstetric units have closed, particularly in rural areas. As a result, women in these areas have to travel an average of 35 miles for care, compared to 9 miles in full-access counties, a gap linked to worse maternal and infant health outcomes.
The Trump administration’s cuts to Medicaid—which covers more than 40 percent of births in the U.S.—will only expand maternity care deserts and further limit access to prenatal and postpartum care for patients.
Mobile clinics like this are an effective way to close gaps in care and reach patients in maternity care deserts, but they can’t do it alone.
We need to talk to our friends and family about the danger of maternity care deserts and call on our lawmakers to protect Medicaid coverage, because every woman deserves care close to home.