Dr. Shameka Poetry Thomas, Ph.D. (also known as “Dr. Poetry) is a Global Maternal and Child Health Scientist and Medical Sociologist at Harvard University, School of Public Health, where she is the principal investigator of the SICKLE CELL WOMEN & GIRLS (S.W.A.G.) PROJECT OF ACCRA, GHANA (Instagram: @SWAGProject_Ghana).
 
Dr. Poetry completed a two-year postdoctoral fellowship at the National Institutes of Health (NIH)/National Human Genomics Research Institutes (NHGRI)-Bethesda campus, where her scientific research
focused on patient perceptions of noninvasive prenatal testing (NIPT) among Black women with genetic conditions, such as sickle cell disease.
 
Dr. Poetry received her Ph.D. from University of Miami, where her dissertation entitled, “Giving Birth in South Florida: A Phenomenological Study on the Pregnancy and Birthing Experiences among Black Women,” was nominated for the Most Outstanding Dissertation award at the American Sociological Association, Medical Sociology section, 2020. Her scientific research was also invited to be a speaker at the Harvard Medical School’s Physicians for Human Rights (2019) and the Maternal Health Policy summit at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (2018).
 
 Dr. Poetry has won various research grants and a variety of publications, world-wide. One of her coauthored publications on pregnancy and birthing experiences among Black women was listed as one of the TOP 20 most downloaded articles in the Sociology Compass Journal between 2018-2019.

Dr. Poetry is an alum of Spelman College, where her research won 1st Place in Spelman’s Annual Research Conference as well as the Scholar‐Activism award. She also was a distinguished global health scholar at the University of Cape Town, South Africa and the University of California-Berkeley, USA.
 
DRPOETRYSPEAKSHEALTH, LLC, is her official wellness brand! As the founder and CEO, she infuses her love for divine feminine energy into wellness, poetry, yoga, meditation, and photography throughout her travels across the African Diaspora.
 
To learn more, READ HER STORY and subscribe to her YouTube Channel @DrPoetrySpeaksHealth