NORFOLK, Va. — When a woman gives birth, everyone’s focus and care tend to land on the new little one. However, it’s important to keep a keen eye on how mothers are feeling, because they are at an increased risk of death up to a year after giving birth. Symptoms like relentless headaches, severe swelling and chest pain could be warning signs of a serious complication.
“This is not to scare you. This is to prepare you [to know the warning signs],” said Jenny Kennard, a nurse at Sentara Norfolk General Hospital. “This is us advocating for you through education.”
Kennard read about East Carolina University Medical Center’s “I Gave Birth” bracelet program aimed at spreading awareness about postpartum health to mothers and medical professionals. Last year, she started giving bracelets to mothers at Sentara Norfolk General Hospital, along with education about postpartum warning signs. Her mission has spread to several other Sentara campuses.
“It's more than a bracelet. It's the women wearing the bracelet,” said Kennard. “We need to prioritize maternal health.”
Kennard said her mission was driven by a startling statistic highlighted in the Virginia Department of Health’s Maternal Mortality Review: Hampton Roads has the second highest maternal mortality rate in the state. More than a third of those deaths, according to the report, happen between 43 days and 365 days after the end of a pregnancy.
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“If a woman comes in and says, ‘I have a headache that won't go away, or I'm overwhelmingly tired, or, you know, I've had this swelling that's increasing, or this bleeding that's increasing,’ instead of just saying, ‘Oh, well, this is normal. You just had a baby,’ we need to figure out why this is happening.”
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention,700 women die every year in the United States due to postpartum complications. The underlying causes, according to the CDC, include:
- Mental health conditions (including deaths to suicide and overdose/poisoning related to substance use disorder) (23%)
- Excessive bleeding (hemorrhage) (14%)
- Cardiac and coronary conditions (relating to the heart) (13%)
- Infection (9%)
- Thrombotic embolism (a type of blood clot) (9%)
- Cardiomyopathy (a disease of the heart muscle) (9%)
- Hypertensive disorders of pregnancy (relating to high blood pressure) (7%)
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However, most pregnancy related deaths are preventable with prompt treatment. That’s why the CDC and Sentara Health say it’s important to seek help for the following symptoms:
- Headache that won’t go away or gets worse over time
- Dizziness or fainting
- Changes in your vision
- Fever of 100.4° degree or higher
- Extreme swelling of your hands or face
- Thoughts of harming yourself or your baby
- Trouble breathing
- Chest pain or fast beating heart
- Severe nausea or throwing up
- Severe belly pain that doesn’t go away
- Baby’s movement stopping or slowing during pregnancy
- Severe swelling, redness or pain of your leg or arm
- Vaginal bleeding or fluid leaking during pregnancy
- Heavy vaginal bleeding or discharge after pregnancy
- Overwhelming tiredness
New mother Shelly Cadenhead received one of the bracelets earlier this month after giving birth to her daughter Nora. She said doctors and nurses at Sentara Norfolk General Hospital helped her navigate a difficult delivery because she had preeclampsia, or hypertension developed during pregnancy.
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“I was in distress,” said Cadenhead, who said previous doctors did not make her aware of the deadly complications preeclampsia could cause, like stroke and seizures. “I didn’t actually know what it was.”
More than two decades earlier at the same hospital, doctors saved Tamika Quinn’s life when she suffered two strokes just days after delivering her daughter.
“I woke up and felt like an elephant was sitting on my head,” said Quinn about the day she nearly died, less than two weeks after giving birth. “I remember that pain getting so intense that I was crying.”
Quinn initially sought help at an urgent care for her severe and unrelenting headache, but she said doctors there gave her pain medicine and sent her home.
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“For me, that ‘send her home’ was ‘send her home to die’, because that's what would have happened if I had stayed home,” she said.
Quinn’s late husband drove her to the Emergency Department at Sentara Norfolk General Hospital, where she passed upon entering.
“I woke up three days later, and I'd had a bleed on the right side of my brain that left the entire left side of my body paralyzed,” Quinn said.
Quinn, now a stroke awareness advocate, said it is a miracle she recovered her ability to walk and talk. She’s thankful the same hospital that saved her life by not dismissing her concerns 23 years ago is on a mission to make moms a priority.
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“Now, women will have the bracelet, and the doctors and the nurses will be able to see the bracelets [and know] we have to take special care here,” Quinn said.
Nearly 2,000 bracelets have been ordered for Sentara hospitals, with the goal of having them for all family maternity centers within the Sentara health system.
