June 28, 2013
TriHealth’s Helping Opiate-addicted Pregnant women Evolve (HOPE) Program has been awarded a $25,000 grant from The March of Dimes Ohio Chapter.
Through the HOPE program, TriHealth provides safe and patient-centered care to chemically dependent pregnant women in Greater Cincinnati.
The grant will be used to add a postpartum follow-up component to enhance care for opiate-addicted pregnant women. TriHealth’s Good Samaritan Hospital will develop and implement a program that builds on the capacity of the HOPE Program and its existing Outreach Ministries and Community Health Worker program infrastructure, to ensure the development of a postpartum care plan for mother and infant, increase compliance with postpartum care and support the addiction recovery process established during pregnancy.
“Pregnancy is often a window of opportunity where women ravaged by narcotic addiction awaken enough to seek care and begin recovery,” said Dr. Michael Marcotte, Maternal-Fetal Medicine specialist and physician champion of the HOPE Program.
“This window often closes quickly after delivery of the baby, especially when the baby is born addicted and separated from the mother. Providing support in the postpartum period, when there are new and intensely stressful circumstances, requires ongoing support from the HOPE team. We see the HOPE Postpartum Care Enhancement Project, funded by the March of Dimes grant, as an opportunity to help the woman and ultimately her family have control of her addiction. It is an innovative way to address issues between pregnancies in a group of women at high risk of adverse pregnancy outcomes in their next pregnancy.”
The goal of the HOPE Program is to have better birth outcomes and reduce preterm labor through developing personalized care plans for each patient. The program offers comprehensive prenatal care integrated with chemical dependency treatment to reduce the average low birth weight in this population and improve the percentage of patients who remain substance-free during their pregnancy.
An individual’s treatment plan usually involves a combination of the following: case management, social work support, referrals to available community support services, nutrition counseling, financial counseling, referrals to Methadone Maintenance Treatment Facilities, referrals to prenatal care and ongoing patient follow up at the Good Samaritan Hospital Faculty Medical Center Prenatal Clinic staffed by OB/GYN residents who are supervised by Maternal -Fetal Medicine physicians.
“This grant is one of the many ways March of Dimes helps fulfill its mission to improve the health of babies by preventing birth defects, prematurity and infant mortality,” said Lisa Holloway from March of Dimes Cincinnati. “We are happy to award grant funding to TriHealth’s HOPE Program for the follow-up component of the program for opiate addicted pregnant women.”
For more information about the HOPE Program, contact Tosha Hill, HOPE Program Case Manager at 513 862 5132.