Senator Brown cosponsors bill aimed at decreasing infant mortality in Ohio

Dr. Tanya Banerjee on the importance of prenatal, maternal care from Kelsey Leyva on Vimeo.

Story by Kelsey Leyva

Jinre Jones, senior at Kent State University, wanted to stay local when she began looking for an OB-GYN after she found out she was pregnant in September of 2013.

“I was trying to stay in town just for convenience,” Jones said.

Jones, 22, is originally from Lafayette, Indiana and moved to Kent, Ohio in 2011 to pursue a degree in accounting.

“It was difficult to find somebody, especially being [from] out of state and not really knowing anything about the health care system out of state.”

After searching online, she found her options of OB-GYNs practicing in Kent through Robinson Memorial Hospital were limited.

“There were only two to choose from and one was a boy and one was a girl and I just had to basically – I looked at reviews online and that’s how I chose one,” she said.

LISTEN: Jinre Jones on having an OB-GYN

 

According research conducted by the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG), Portage County had only five OB-GYNs practicing in the county in 2013.

Senator Sherrod Brown is cosponsoring a bill that would increase the number of OB-GYNs in counties across Ohio.

The bill, called the Improving Access to Maternity Care Act, calls on the Health Resources and Services Administration to identify health professional shortage areas, or areas lacking OB-GYNs, and the National Health Service Corps (NHSC) to place health providers in those areas.

Dr. Tanya Banerjee, an OB-GYN in Portage County, is one of the five physicians practicing through Robinson Memorial, the county hospital. Banerjee said the information about only five OB-GYNs practicing in the county is somewhat misleading.

“When I Googled that there were a lot of other names besides the five of us that came up,” she said. “Considering that there are just five of us as physicians that delivered in Portage County, I figured that a lot of these physicians were seeing patients for prenatal visits in Portage County but not necessarily delivering in Portage County. They could be delivering at Akron, which is Summit County, or the other surrounding counties such as Geauga County.”

Senator Brown said one of the goals of the bill is to reduce the state’s infant mortality rates.

“[We] always have to make room for tax cuts for wealthy people but can’t seem to invest in giving babies a chance, children a chance,” Brown said. “And I think this making OB-GYNs available in smaller counties where they aren’t will be a small step.”

LISTEN: Senator Brown talks about infant mortality rates nationally and in Ohio

 

Banerjee agrees infant mortality is closely linked to maternal health.

“The healthier we can get our moms to be the less the infant mortality,” she said. “The better prenatal care mothers receive, the better the birth weight and the less the pre-term or premature births.”

Prenatal care and pre-conceptual care are an important part of having a successful pregnancy.

“There are several medical conditions that we can diagnose during pregnancy and actually pre-pregnancy,” Banerjee said. “We actually encourage pre-conceptual care or pre-conceptual visits so that we can address or diagnose conditions that could be taken care of before pregnancy rather than taking care of it during pregnancy.”

Banerjee said trust has a lot to do with the care an expecting mother receives. This is why she has trouble with the part of the bill that calls on the NHSC to step in.

“Prenatal care is very intimately related to trust because women have to trust the physicians they’re coming to to get prenatal care,” she said. “What that brings us to is would a woman who needs prenatal care go to a physician or be comfortable with a physician that she doesn’t know? I think the answer is no. They want to stick to a physician they know, that have been serving the area or delivers at a hospital which is familiar to them and is convenient for them.”

Banerjee admits Portage County could increase the number of physicians available in the area.

“We used to have six physicians in our group and our senior most member Dr. Egdell retired two years ago and we have not hired a replacement physician,” she said. “He was in practice for 40 years so he accumulated 40 years’ worth of patients and I think we’re struggling a little bit to fill his gap.”

OB-GYNs and nurse midwives are the only ones qualified and willing to provide prenatal care.

“Family physicians don’t serve for prenatal care anymore,” Banerjee said. “They pretty much limit themselves to seeing adults and children for other reasons other than prenatal care. Internists typically do not offer prenatal care. That’s a very, very specific thing that only OB-GYNs and nurse midwives can do.”

But even if there was an abundance of OB-GYN physicians practicing in Portage County, patients are partially responsible for the level of care they receive.

“In order for patients to get very good care, there has to be a certain amount of patient participation,” she said. “At the end of the day I think it’s a combined participation of both the provider [or] the physician and the patient as to what the outcome is.”

Although Banerjee acknowledged Portage County could use more physicians, she argues quality is more important than quantity.

“I think most of the times what we notice is in a particular setting there may be tons of different doctors, but the level of training may not be as good,” she said. “I don’t necessarily think that the number matters as much as quality.”

Senator Brown said his bill to increase the number of OB-GYNs in Ohio is only one part of several things that must be done to improve maternal care and infant mortality rates in Ohio.

“I don’t claim to say that’s every answer because some regions that have many OB-GYNs still have terribly high infant mortality rates, but it’s one of many steps we should be taking on child nutrition, on earned income tax credit, on minimum wage, on funding the public health infrastructure better, on scientific research, on helping children’s hospitals,” Brown said. “The list is long and important and we absolutely need to do better.”

The bill was assigned to a congressional committee on March 3 of this year.

“We’re working on lining up a bunch of bipartisan sponsors and I’m hopeful it may be included in another bill down the road,” he said.