WAGNER, S.D. (Dakota News Now) – Living in a rural area brings with it many challenges, some of the most significant of which include medical emergencies surrounding baby care and birth.
Tonight's Avera Medical Minute features how rural community health systems are working together to learn skills to improve health outcomes for mothers and babies.
No babies were being born at Wagner Community Memorial Hospital the day we visited, but a simulation was taking place.
“While we don't intentionally deliver babies at our facility, we do an average of about five births a year, so being able to get this hands-on learning experience means a lot, especially for our medical staff and nurses who don't get this opportunity every day,” said Tiana Smith, MD, emergency physician at Wagner Community Memorial Hospital.
This effort is just one part of a larger effort: The Avera Institute has received funding from the National Institutes of Health to create a Maternal and Child Health Research Center, which charges researchers and health care workers a fee to go into the community and provide these training opportunities that will help improve outcomes for mothers and babies.
“Fortunately, our Wagner staff and the IHS team we're working with have actually been through this, but practicing is really, really important because it builds teamwork skills, it builds communication, it teaches you how to do it so everyone clearly understands the steps that need to be taken, and it builds the community relationships that are so important to support mothers and babies. Being a mother can be hard sometimes,” said Kimberly McKay, MD, obstetrician-gynecologist and director of medical research at Avera Institute.
The simulation has two assumptions based on real-life situations: a mother gives birth and then bleeds, and staff have to take control of the situation, and a baby is born prematurely and needs to be resuscitated.
“So, if necessary, we'll work with the team to support the newborn's airway and help stabilise the baby as they are transported,” Dr McKay said.
“This is a great opportunity to see what's coming in. It's a very unusual thing to get in so it's good to practice on mannequins so when it actually does come in we're a little bit more prepared,” said Berkley Erickson, CNP, Wagner Community Memorial Hospital.
“These mannequins are so lifelike they can check vital signs, track the fetal heartbeat, start IVs, examine the cervix and even receive the baby as if it were an emergency birth,” Dr Smith said.
“We provide the simulation, but the local residents here are the ones who can teach us how to better support their patients' birth experience,” Dr. MacKay said.
Connecting directly with community leaders is a rare opportunity to better understand rural cultures and highlight the partnership between both healthcare organizations as they work together to better serve them.
“We're not competitors, we're all taking care of the same population, and the way we take care of our residents and our community is by collaborating, so being able to do this education that involves staff from both locations is huge,” Dr. Smith said.
“This education and training is the foundation for everything we do to ensure we're not only making improvements in maternal health outcomes, but also to sustain the changes we need to make over time,” Dr. MacKay said.
These simulations will be implemented at facilities across the Midwest in the coming months to help improve maternal care. To learn more about the Avera Research Institute and the Maternal Health Initiative, visit www.avera.org/medicalminute.
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