Kai Tao is a seasoned certified nurse midwife with experience in health policy, programs, and clinical operations. Her experience includes opening a birth center for underserved womxn in AZ to expanding medical abortion scope for APRNs and starting affordable vasectomy services in IL.
For the last 19 years, she has been practicing as a CNM with a large FQHC and attending deliveries at Northwestern Prentice Hospital. Her previous day jobs include overseeing operations for 17 ambulatory family planning clinics and serving as a Senior Policy Advisor, co-creating the Illinois Family Planning Action Plan- a multipronged approach to expanding contraceptive access via payment reform. Prior to her role as the Principal of Impact and Innovation for ICAN! (Illinois Contraceptive Access Now), Kai was the Chief Program Officer for the Chicago Department of Public Health overseeing the Maternal, Infant, Child and Adolescent Health Bureau and STI/HIV Bureau. Kai is an OB advisor for the Illinois Perinatal Quality Collaborative, championing immediate postpartum LARC and Birth Equity. Dr. Tao has been actively engaged in patient safety and quality improvement work for the last decade with ACOG in various roles currently serving as an associate reviewer with their Voluntary Review of Quality Care (VRQC) program. Kai received her Master of Science and Doctor of Nursing from the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Center and her Master of Public Health from Harvard School of Public Health.