A “sense of dread” is spreading in Alabama where three hospitals are set to stop delivering babies, creating more challenges for some at-risk pregnant women and overall fears about receiving time-sensitive care.
Shelby and Monroe counties will be without maternity units in hospitals as the units close in the coming weeks in a “state has one of the country’s highest maternal mortality rates,” according to NBC News.
To access a hospital with an OB-GYN, pregnant women in Shelby County will reportedly need to go at least 17 miles more in their travels even as women in a bordering county also face the prospect of long trips since their local hospital lacks an obstetrics unit.
“People in Monroe County, meanwhile, could face drives between 35 to 100 miles to a labor and delivery department,” NBC News reported. “Trekking that far to give birth is not unheard of in Alabama, in which more than a third of the counties are maternity care deserts, according to the March of Dimes — meaning they have no hospital with obstetrics care, birth centers, OB-GYNs or certified nurse midwives.”
“There’s a sense of dread knowing that there’s going to be families who are now not only driving to the county over, but driving through three counties,” Honour McDaniel, director of maternal and infant health initiatives for the March of Dimes in Alabama, said.
A former Princeton Baptist Medical Center doctor voiced concerns about the “bad outcomes” that could result from the shuttering of maternal care in the area hospitals.
“People are going to show up delivering in the ER, and you’re going to have bad outcomes,” Dr. Jesanna Cooper, an OB-GYN who worked at the Birmingham hospital, said. “If you show up with a very premature baby and deliver in the ER, and you don’t have a NICU and you don’t have an obstetrics team, things aren’t going to go well.”
USA Today reported:
In August, the Milken Institute, a non-profit think tank, released a study that found that Alabama had the highest maternal mortality rate in the country. The study also revealed that overall maternal mortality rate was over 64 deaths per 100,000 births, almost double the nationwide average.
Data from the Centers for Disease Control also shows that Alabama had one of the highest maternal mortality rates between 2018 and 2021.
That figure is even higher for Black women with over 100 out of every 100,000 birthday resulting in death.
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In a statement, Monroe County Hospital blamed a staffing shortage for its closure of the maternity unit.
“It seems no amount of money provided by the hospital board for the support of Labor and Delivery has been sufficient to maintain this service. We have supported, and would continue to support, Labor and Delivery if there was someone who could provide the service,” the hospital reportedly said in a statement.
A spokesperson for the Brookwood Baptist Health care network told NBC News that the decision came “after careful consideration.”
“We will support a smooth transition of care for patients and Brookwood Baptist Health remains committed to providing outstanding maternity care within our network,” read the statement from the network which has five hospitals in Alabama, including those in Birmingham and Shelby County.
“Nobody wants women and children to do poorly, but you also can’t lose money year over year on a service line,” Dr. John Waits, CEO of the nonprofit Cahaba Medical Care, said. “There’s something broken about the funding stream that helps us take care of our women and children,”
The closure of maternity units is not isolated to Alabama, however, as hospitals in California, Idaho, Massachusetts and Tennessee have reportedly experienced the same issue.
“If patients have blood pressure issues that they’re not tending to because they don’t want to be bothered with the extra 45-minute drive to go be evaluated, then there’ll be times where patients truly have life-threatening issues, but due to the distance and difficulty in getting to the hospital, they may choose not to be evaluated,” said Dr. Rowell Ashford, an OB-GYN at Princeton and Shelby.
“That just feeds into the problem relating to neonatal morbidity and mortality and maternal morbidity and mortality,” Ashford added.
Writers and editors can be contacted at [email protected] with feedback, tips, or corrections.
Originally from New York, Powers graduated from New York University and eventually made her way to sunny South Florida. Powers also contributes to BizPac Review.
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