It's black maternal health week,
dedicated to amplifying voices behind
really tragic statistics affecting
black mothers and our babies.
America's maternal mortality rates are
among the highest in the developed world.
Black mothers die from complications
related to pregnancy at roughly 2
to three times the rate of white,
Hispanic, Asian American women,
according to the CDC,
Black women in the US are also 50%
more likely to have a premature
baby than white women.
Not disparity exists regardless of
income level or economic status,
and it you know it's becoming
more recognized through the
media through public stories,
even from celebrities such
as Serena Williams.
There are so many factors
that need to be addressed,
and it's not something that's
going to be fixed by one
person or one organization
or one healthcare system.
The White
House officially recognized black
Maternal Health Week last year with
the Biden administration promising
to pursue policies to close the
disparities in quality health care.
We want to bring in doctor Payal Kohli
to really do our part to extend the
conversation during this important week.
And let's start at the beginning at the why.
Why do you think these statistics
are the way that they are?
You know
Alex for the longest time in medicine,
we thought it was biological
differences that it's own more chronic
health problems like hypertension,
more risk of conditions like peripartum
cardiomyopathy where your heart?
Weekends, but we're realizing more and more.
That's only a small piece of the pie
and the majority of the pie is actually
differences in in structural racism.
Differences in implicit bias that we do not
recognize and differences in access to care,
and the reason we found this out is
because if you look at preeclampsia,
which is a condition that can
develop during pregnancy,
a black woman in the US is much more
likely to have preeclampsia than
a black woman in another country.
So we realized that it probably has
less to do with biology and more
to do with cultural differences.
When you talk about implicit
biases and really should probably
talk about explicit biases
under this umbrella as well,
is there training that needs to be done?
Education conversations
with physicians about this
so much? I mean,
I feel like the needle has started
to move in the right direction,
even during my career.
So in medical school, for example,
we never had training about
implicit or explicit bias,
but more recently we started to have
continuing medical education programs,
but I think we're not doing enough,
so there was just a survey from
about four years ago in 2000,
2016, about six years ago.
Of white medical students and
greater than 50% of them had
false impressions of black people
having biological differences
that were not actually accurate.
So that tells me that there's
a lot of work to be done that
is disturbing. And, you know,
we talk about Colorado specifically.
There are very few black
doctors in this state.
I've done some research on the topic
and less than 1% of doctors are black.
How does that exasperate these issues?
I think it just widens that gap that already.
This, you know, and I think that there
are studies out there that tell us,
for example, that a black baby treated by
a black doctor is less likely to die than
a black baby treated by a white doctor.
But even in a black doctor's hand,
that black baby does worse.
So that tells us that across
the board we need to do.
Whether you're you're white,
Hispanic or black Indian,
we really need more training and
education around these issues.
And people want doctors that look like them.
People want health care
providers that look like them,
so we really need to work on training.
Minorities up in the healthcare system
and this is a national issue.
It's such a nuanced issue,
but how does it?
I mean, how do we even start
to kind of push that needle?
You said some progress is being made,
but like changes locally
that could potentially change
this in a broader sense,
I think what we're doing
today is really important.
Awareness and education is
the most important piece.
Recognize that there is a problem.
Then try to identify what are the
factors contributing to that problem
and here we've already identified some,
such as the lack of diversity
in our healthcare force and
then really put in systems.
The place to try to address those.
I also think social programs to try
to improve access for healthcare
to black mothers allow them to
have the same sort of privileges.
Same sort of, you know,
care for their babies in the
entire peripartum period.
Those are the next steps,
so it's encouraging to hear from
Doctor Andrews to hear from you.
You know people that we trust in this
community that your eyes are on,
you know, know that this is
something that you need to
tackle and progress is coming.
So that makes you feel good.
But in the meantime, last question.
We just gotta wrap here,
but how can we advocate as black
mothers for our own health
care? I think you have to because
until the system catches up,
you have to be your own best advocate.
The best way to do that is to know
the warning signs of something bad,
swollen ankle shortness of breath,
blurry vision.
You know anything that doesn't feel right.
Make sure you see your doctor and the
2nd is to create a network around you.
Family members and healthcare providers
that you trust and look up to.
It takes a village. Dr Coley.
We appreciate you. Thank you.