Maternal health partnership to connect Coastal Bend mothers with resources

A new initiative aimed at improving maternal health outcomes will connect South Texas mothers with health workers.

The Community Hands Advancing Maternal Health Promotion, or CHAMPions, program is aimed at addressing maternal health disparities in underserved populations in Southeast Texas.

The Texas A&M University School of Nursing received a five-year, $2.28 million grant from the U.S. Health and Human Services Department for this partnership with Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi's College of Nursing and Health Sciences, Driscoll Children's Hospital and Driscoll Health Plan and the Global Institute for Hispanic Health.

Robin Page, an associate professor at the Texas A&M University School of Nursing is the principal investigator for the project. Page is a member of the Texas Maternal Mortality and Morbidity Review Committee.

The committee's 2022 report outlined findings that 90 percent of pregnancy-related deaths the committee reviewed were preventable. Factors such as obesity, mental health disorders, discrimination and substance use disorder contributed to pregnancy-related deaths.

"A lot of these deaths in new mothers are preventable," Page said. "By having somebody who has additional training and providing support for pregnant and postpartum women, we can help identify problems earlier."

The report also identified disparities in maternal mortality, with non-Hispanic Black women being disproportionately impacted.

Among the committee's recommendations are increased access to comprehensive health services, implementing statewide maternal health and safety initiatives, increasing public awareness and fostering safe and supportive community environments.

The CHAMPions program will train community health workers to help pregnant and postpartum mothers mitigate risk and improve health outcomes. This could include home visits.

The program serves Bee, Refugio, San Patricio, Nueces and Jim Wells counties. The "maternal health navigators" will also engage community members to better understand maternal health.

Erin Richmond, director of the Global Institute for Hispanic Health, said the institute would be hiring and supporting the maternal health workers.

"The counties that are served by this program, they include several counties that have a lot of rural areas and there are health care provider shortage areas, or what's called maternal health deserts," Richmond said.

Richmond added that in the Coastal Bend area there are high rates of gestational diabetes and uninsured women.

Richmond said the CHAMPions program will help bridge gaps and deliver health information in an innovative way.

Doctors in the community will identify and recommend at-risk mothers who could benefit from extra services for the program, Page said. The program is free for participants who chose to enroll.

"The (program) would be sharing information about pregnancy and postpartum and doing some basic, validated screening polls, for example screening for things like depression and anxiety," Page said. "We know that a lot of mental health conditions are more prevalent during pregnancy and in the postpartum."

Sometimes, problems don't appear until after delivery when women are home, Page said.

"Typically the postpartum care through a provider is only for about the first six weeks," Page said. "But we know from the data that a lot of times problems will surface well beyond that six-week period."

The program will serve mothers for up to a year postpartum.

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This article originally appeared on Corpus Christi Caller Times: Partnership tackles maternal health in South Texas