First Steps and Beyond (Video)

Keea: So, I remember like it was yesterday. I woke up, Monday morning. My husband and I got into the ER. The first thing they said, ‘Hey, are you in pain?’ The answer's ‘no.’ And they’re looking at me like, ‘Okay, you're not cramping?’ ‘No. Why am I bleeding?’

Pre-term labor can happen to anybody, no matter what color you are. I went to labor prematurely. The bleeding, they couldn't stop it because it was true active labor, and that is why I had Logan so early.

So, I remember the look that you gave me, Dr. Udrea gave me. Like, you’re doctors because you can't tell me what I want to hear. And what I want to hear was, ‘He’s gonna be fine,’ you know, because there's not a guarantee.

And I just like, ‘Is he going to be ok? Is he going to make it? Save him. Don't worry about me.’

The hallway was so long to NICU. And when I saw him, I remember he put his arm up. And I was like, ‘You got this look Logan, you got this!’

I think that when we decided to stop, I kind of stopped in a moment because I was like, I thought I can do more. And again, we can't do more. We have to accept that this was God's plan and he was here for eight hours. And that was a blessing because everyone was not expecting him to be here for eight minutes. So we were able to spend eight hours and I wouldn't take that back.

Reporter: The infant mortality rate in the black community here in Pittsburgh is a real cause for concern. Any number of over one of course it's too high. But a yearly report reveals that sadly, the numbers are alarming.

Dr. Deirdre Cooper Owens: The United States has higher rates of maternal and infant mortality than any other wealthy nation. And that rate, unfortunately continues to rise. Every year 700 to 900 women die and 50,000 experienced severe pregnancy complications. According to the maternal mortality review, two out of three pregnancy related deaths are preventable.

Each year in this country around 20,000 infants die due to birth defects return and low birth weight, injuries, SIDS, and pregnancy complications.

The perinatal outcomes in the United States are alarming and exacerbated when we look at the outcomes of black mothers birthing people and their babies.

Black women are dying at three to four times the rate of white women. And black babies are dying at two times the rate of white babies. These disparities are the same regardless of socio-economic status, and educational levels and cannot be solely attributed to social determinants of health or individual decision making.

These outcomes did not happen overnight and have been centuries in the making. Racism in the United States have led to centuries of trauma, violence, stress and discrimination against black women, working people and their babies.

Throughout the 20th century, and up to today, these abuses and mistreatment continue leading to lack of quality care, inadequate support, and patients are blamed for their negative medical outcomes. This history of blame puts the focus on individuals and families rather than recognizing this is a national crisis.

Thankfully, however, the percentage of birth workers is increasing. Committed to the principles of reproductive justice, they are helping to improve these outcomes and empowering black families.

Dr. Margaret Larkins-Pettigrew: With the history in present day outcomes in mind, we had Highmark Health and AHN are working on reducing black infant mortality in Allegheny County and in our own system.

First steps and Beyond, a signature program through AHN’s Enterprise Equitable Health Institute, is working to reduce black infant mortality through an interdisciplinary approach. We are blending lived experiences, evidence based interventions, and expertise of the entire collaborative.

We're collaborating with Pittsburgh's healthcare systems, community members, doulas, community-based organizations, and government to co-create a unified strategy that will address both medical and social needs through an equity and social justice centered lens.

Our goals are to reduce racial disparities and pre-term birth rates, eliminate sleep related deaths and expand the postpartum period support, also known as the fourth trimester.

It's a program that is especially critical here in Pittsburgh, where 15 out of every 1000 black babies born would die before their first birthday.

And that statistic is just unacceptable. It's also three times the rate of what we're seeing among white babies. We know that these interventions will also positively impact all. We're working with our partners to dismantle structural racism through ongoing education, assessment and accountability.

We're also identified a shared platform that includes programmatic and individual data, resources and referrals that are accessible, actionable and measurable.

At Allegheny Health Network in Highmark Health, we aim to provide inclusive health care throughout the pregnancy journey by implementing CenteringPregnancy, which is an evidence-based model of community prenatal care, developing a community informed training on obstetric racism conducting a birth equity assessment, participating in a doula working group to improve relationships and policies. Hosting a Mother's of Color support group through the Alexis Joy Center in partnership with Brown Mamas and Healthy Start. And finally, outlining benefits needed for improved maternal and infant health outcomes. We are dedicated to supporting work and are excited to find even more ways to collaborate. We have amazing partners who are currently participating in some of their initiatives as well, like the Allegheny County birth plan. Together, we can stop the preventable deaths of black babies and mothers.