Sandra de la Cruz-Yarrison

Sandra de la Cruz-Yarrison is a social justice visionary and entrepreneur determined to overcome women’s health adversities in the Rio Grande Valley (RGV). She serves as the Executive Director of Holy Family Services, Inc., the longest continuously licensed freestanding birth center in Texas and the only nonprofit organization of its kind in the RGV—a region where cesarean rates often exceed 34% and can approach 38% in some communities. As a former client of the birth center, where her own birth story transformed her life, she uses that lived experience as inspiration to nurture culturally responsive and holistic health services. As a second generation American, consciously rooted in her Tex-Mex values, she is a woman healing past barriers that have shaped and molded her community for generations. In that journey, she empowers women and families to achieve equitable health outcomes through community based solutions and midwifery care. She stands alongside thousands of women seeking to have fair, informed and empowered voices in their health journeys.