delivery
Mamas on Bedrest: The CDC’s Report on Certified Professional Midwives
January 27th, 2012Bedrest Coach Darline Turner-Lee reviews and comments on a recent press release issued by The Big Push for Midwives Campaign.
In the Press Release, the CDC notes an increase in home births in non-hispanic white women, yet decreasing or stagnat numbers amongst women of color. The press release also noted that
“The CDC report as well as other reports show that babies born to women cared for by Certified Professional Midwives (CPM’s) are far less likely to be preterm or born low birth weight, two of theprimary contributing factors not only to infant mortality, but to racial and ethnic disparities in birth outcomes.”
The Big Push for Midwives is hoping that this report from the CDC will spur action in legislation and amongst medical organizations to allow CPM’s to care for and be reimbursed for care given to women of color and low income women-women who might most benefit from CPM care.
Mamas on Bedrest: LifeWrap May be Life Saving for Mamas all over the World!
January 23rd, 2012There is a new and potentially lifesaving device available for mamas called LifeWrap.
The LifeWrap (generic name: Non-pneumatic Anti-shock Garment or NASG) is a first-aid device used to stabilize women who are suffering from obstetric hemorrhage and shock. According to the LifeWrap website,
“The leading cause of maternal mortality (deaths from pregnancy and childbirth related complications) is obstetric hemorrhage in which a woman bleeds heavily, most often immediately after giving birth. A woman somewhere in the world dies every 4 minutes from this kind of complication.”
LifeWrap has been studied extensively by SuEllen Miller, CNM, Ph.D, professor at UCSF and the director of the Safe Motherhood Project at UCSF. As Miller shares with KGO TV in San Francisco,
“If they (women) bleed they’re (often) very far from skilled care. They need something to buy them time so they can get to the kind of facility where they can get a blood transfusion or get surgery and that’s what the anti-shock garment does. It (LifeWrap) buys time.”
The LifeWrap is made of neoprene and VelcroTM and looks like the lower half of a wetsuit cut into segments. The LifeWrap reverses shock by returning blood to the heart, lungs and brain. This restores the woman’s consciousness, pulse and blood pressure. Additionally, the LifeWrap decreases bleeding from the parts of the body compressed under it. Recent research has identified that the pressure applied by the LifeWrap serves to significantly increase the resistive index (i. e. increase the tone and help reduce free flow of blood) of the internal iliac artery (which is responsible for supplying the majority of blood flow to the uterus via the uterine arteries). Best of all, LifeWrap is a very low-tech device and can be applied by anyone after a short, simple training. It is very low cost, approximately $300 per suit, so it can be readily accessible by purchase or donation to countries and practices in need.
According to the Interview with KGO TV in San Francisco,
“The UCSF team is hoping to present results from its current clinical trial to the World Health Organization (WHO). If the LifeWrap is added to the organization’s approved medical device list, it would clear the way for donors to provide it to poorer countries, potentially saving thousands of lives.”
This is truly ground breaking news and research! It will be wonderful to live in a world where all mamas can safely give birth and actually live to see their babies.
An actual LifeWrap being used in Zambia. This image comes from the LifeWrap website.
Resources
KGO TV News Report with Carolyn Johnson
WikiPedia: The Non-Pneumatic anti-shock garment
Mamas on Bedrest: Priorities for Maternal and Child Health Identified
December 21st, 2011
Click to take the postpartum depression survey conducted by Case Western Reserve University http://filer.case.edu/~axp335/postpartdep.htm Thank you very much for your consideration.
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On the heels of the 20/20 special segment, “Giving Life: A Risky Proposition” World Health Organization (WHO) has released Essential Interventions, Commodities and Guidelines for Reproductive, Maternal, Newborn and Child Health. This comprehensive document outlines the necessary steps and guidelines nations (developing low and mid income nations in particular) must adopt in order to further reduce maternal, infant and child mortality and to have a chance of reaching Millennium Development Goals .
Maternal, Infant and Child mortality is a global issue. According to the report,
Annually, 358,000 women die worldwide during pregnancy and childbirth. Approximately 7.6 million children die before the age of 5 years, and those in low-income countries are about 18 times more likely to die during that time than children in high-income countries. Under-5 mortality rates are highest in sub-Saharan Africa and Southern Asia.
Maternal, newborn, and under-5 mortality rates have declined in accordance with Millennium Development Goals 4 (reduce the under-5 mortality rate by two thirds between 1990 and 2015) and 5 (reduce the maternal mortality ratio by three quarters between 1990 and 2015). However, the improvements are not occurring quickly enough to reach the 2015 targets.
WHO and its partners The AGA Khan University (in Pakistan) and The Partnership for Maternal, Newborn and Child Health performed a survey of more than 50,000 review papers to determine what steps are necessary to critically impact maternal, newborn and child health. Their goal was to identify key interventions that low and middle income countries can implement that are cost effective, will maximize resources and maximize the health and mortality of women, infants and children and thus help these countries reach worldwide millennium health and development goals. Their research has revealed some 56 key evidence-based interventions that when implemented, will have a significant impact on maternal, newborn and child health.
Rather than try and list all the interventions here, I refer you to their report, Essential Interventions, Commodities and Guidelines for Reproductive, Maternal, Newborn and Child Health.
For each intervention, the authors indicated whether they recommend the intervention be delivered,
- Through the community or in the home-These health care workers are often community volunteers and/or influential outreach workers who have knowledge of the local community and are trusted by the community.
- Via healthcare professionals, outreach workers, or community health workers-Health care providers at this level are skilled professionals as well as outreach workers.
- In hospitals-Either local hospitals or regional referral hospitals that can provide higher levels of intervention and care.
The interventions were classified broadly as adolescents/prepregnancy, pregnancy, childbirth, postnatal (mother), postnatal (newborn), infancy and childhood, and cross-cutting community strategies.
Researchers believe that the recommendations in this report will help low and middle income countries’ health care workers best utilize their resources in an effort to reduce Maternal, Newborn and Child deaths. These guidelines will also help countries develop policies and regulations that will not only benefit women and children’s health, but also take into consideration the health care and policy environments of the countries so that all citizens will benefit.
