As a nurse, Essa Smith knew something was wrong during her recent cesarean section. Laying on the operating table, she felt cold and woozy. She inquired about a blood transfusion, but was told her numbers weren’t yet low enough.
“It got to the point that I said, ‘I need you guys to listen to me. This is what I need,'” Smith recounted. “The little interventions that I felt like, as a nurse, you would offer to your patient, I had to ask for.”
Smith ended up receiving a blood transfusion two days after giving birth. She remained in the labor and delivery wing of the hospital, rather than moving to the mother-baby wing with her daughter, as a result of her fragile condition.
Smith, who received care through her workplace, was one of several people who spoke about a traumatic birthing experience during the Black Maternal Health Summit at Hood College in Frederick on Saturday.
A 2022 study by the Frederick County Health Department and Health Management Associates found that Black women in Frederick County were more likely to give birth prematurely or by cesarean section than non-Black women.
The study also found that Black women were less likely to receive prenatal care than their non-Black counterparts. The racial maternal health disparity persisted even when controlling for socioeconomic status and individual behaviors.
The results of the countywide study mirror national trends in Black maternal health. According to the Centers for Disease Control, Black women are three times more likely to die from pregnancy-related causes than white women.
Saturday’s event was a collaboration between the Frederick County Health Department and the group Black Mamas Building Bridges, which was started in 2021 by a group of five women who were part of a focus group on Black maternal health in Frederick County.
Yewande Oladeinde is a co-founder of Black Mamas Building Bridges and the co-chair of the planning committee for the Black Maternal Health Summit. She too, she said, has experienced pregnancy-related trauma.
Between the births of her first and second children, Oladeinde suffered multiple miscarriages in just over a year’s time. One prompted her to seek urgent medical attention. Though she was doubled over in pain, she said she did not receive care for three hours.
Black Mamas Building Bridges put on the Black Maternal Health Summit as a way to shed light on the issues, both in the health care field and in society as a whole, that lead to worse outcomes for Black mothers and babies in Frederick County.
The group invited a number of providers in the fields of obstetrics, gynecology, and mental health to speak at the summit.
One speaker, Dr. Kanika Harris, gave a presentation about the Black Women’s Health Imperative’s program for training doulas, or trained non-clinical birth workers, to support Black families throughout the process of having a child.
The program, called NOURISH for “New Opportunity to Uncover our Resources Intuition Spirit and Healing,” provides an opportunity for college students to enter the field, where there is a shortage of diverse providers.
Despite the somber tone of much of the event, there was a resounding sense that sharing personal struggles with pregnancy and childbirth could help providers and family support systems achieve better health outcomes for Black mothers and babies in the future.
“When we think of Black maternal health, of course there are negatives,” Danielle Haskin, director of the Frederick County Health Department’s Equity Office, said on Saturday. “But I also think of joy. I think of family.”
