Our Story
Perinatal Community Voices grew out of our successful work with the UNM Volunteer Birth Companion Program, which was founded in 2017 and served birthing families at the University of New Mexico Hospital from 2018-2025.
Our first training group in 2018
With mayor of Albuquerque Tim Keller at the award ceremony for the 2025 Volunteer Group of the Year for the City of Albuquerque
Please download our impact report to learn more about our work and accomplishments with the UNM Birth Companion Program!
After running our Advanced Doula Traineeship in 2024, we grew passionate about supporting and training birthworkers themselves. In addition, now that Medicaid reimbursement is available for doulas in NM, it no longer felt appropriate to ask doulas to volunteer their time (as with the Birth Companion program) when they could be paid a living wage for supporting birthing families.
And so, Perinatal Community Voices was born! Founded by UNM Birth Companion founders Carrie Murphy and Paula Reiss, as well as program manager Ximena Correa, PCV is rooted in care and support for those who care for families.
We are thrilled to focus on workforce development for birthworkers in New Mexico, providing support for new and established birthworkers by strengthening the foundations that allow this work to be sustainable: training, mentorship, community connection, and holistic business and life logistics. We believe that when birthworkers are well-supported and resourced, families across New Mexico will thrive.
We also want to humbly share that we know we are not the only group or people who are working on or have expertise in supporting the perinatal workforce in NM. Perinatal Community Voices exists in relationship with the many birthworkers, organizations, and communities already doing this work across the state. We see our role not as leading, but as listening, learning, collaborating, and sharing. We hope to strengthen what already exists and help to create space for the community’s collective wisdom to shape the future.
Who We Are
Ximena Correa, MBA
Ximena Correa is a perinatal leader, doula, and community advocate committed to advancing equitable, culturally responsive birth support. Originally from Mexico City, she holds a BA in Marketing and an MBA in International Marketing, and brings over two decades of experience in marketing management to her work in perinatal health.
After a transformative childbirth experience, Ximena shifted her career toward birth work and perinatal advocacy. Through her leadership with the UNM Birth Companion Program, she has helped grow community-based programs, strengthen partnerships, and expand training opportunities for birth workers, witnessing firsthand the impact of accessible doula support on families and communities.
A mother of three and married for 18 years, Ximena brings both lived experience and strategic leadership to her work. Through Perinatal Community Voices, she is focused on uplifting community voices, supporting birth workers, and building sustainable, community-centered models of perinatal care.
When she’s not working, Ximena enjoys gardening, cooking, and raising her children in a bilingual, multicultural home rooted in service, compassion, and community connection
Program Manager
Carrie Murphy
Carrie Murphy is a full-spectrum doula, mother, writer, herbalist, and communications professional. She has been a doula since 2012 and has supported families through all kinds of reproductive experiences (including birth, loss, postpartum, and abortion) around the country. Her work on pregnancy, birth, lactation, and parenting has appeared in publications like Elle, Glamour, Women’s Health, and Healthline.
Carrie has been active in advocacy for her entire career, including for doula care, the midwifery model of care, and breastfeeding. She is a co-founder of the New Mexico Doula Association and a co-founder of the University of New Mexico Hospital Birth Companion Program. From 2020-2023, she worked as the Director of Community and Doula Services for doula startup Major Care. She is a former member of Birthmark, a doula collective in New Orleans.
Body literacy, body autonomy, and reproductive justice inform all of Carrie’s work in the world—from her writing to her support of pregnant, birthing, and postpartum people. She believes that everyone should have access to knowledge, tools, and support to live healthy lives and make informed decisions.
Co-founder
Co-founderPaula Reiss
Paula Reiss is a doula and perinatal health advocate focused on bringing doula services to all families. In 2013, after 45 years working in museums and law firms, Paulabecame a doula and refocused her attention on birth equity, reproductive justice, and insurance coverage for doula care. She is a co-founder of the New Mexico Doula Association, the UNM Birth Companion Program and Perinatal Community Voices.
Advocating for access to and equity in maternal health has been the focus of her work. She served for many years on DONA International’s Advocacy Committee and participated in Healthconneçt One’s Birth Equity Leadership Academy. She helped to develop and pass New Mexico’s Doula Credentialing and Access Act as well as drafted a toolkit to assist doulas to become state certified and contracted with Turquoise Care MCOs.
Having long recognized the value of mentorship and other supports for new trained doulas and other perinatal health workers, coupled with her deep-seated desire that every family who would like a doula have one, Paula is thrilled to be carrying forward Perinatal Community Voices’s mission.