Grace Health recently received full approval from the Centering Healthcare Institute as an official Centering site. Per the Centering Healthcare Institute, it is unusual for any site to receive full approval with their initial application.
What is Centering? With CenteringPregnancy, women meet with their healthcare provider and other women with similar due dates throughout their pregnancy. Grace Health started CenteringPregnancy in 2015 with its first group meeting on June 3. During the first meeting, women spent 2 hours with their nurse midwife and nurse getting all of their questions answered plus they learned from the other women in the group by sharing their experiences. CenteringPregnancy offers monthly visits for the first five months and then every two weeks until birth. After the babies are born, the groups have a reunion and share birth stories.
As a result of Centering, there are better health outcomes, women gain more self-confidence, and they build friendships that can last a lifetime. A total of 43% of eligible pregnant women seen at Grace Health are being served through Centering. What do they have to say about Centering? 100% of the women are highly satisfied with the care they received through Centering. Many have stated that they recommend it to others. Breastfeeding rates for Grace Health Centering participants is 83% compared to Grace Health’s overall rate of 79%. Grace Health’s prematurity rate is significantly lower than the rest of Calhoun County and the State. The most recent data available from the State (2014) reports the prematurity rate at 12.3%; Calhoun County, for the same timeframe, is 10.8%. Grace Health’s prematurity rate for 2015 was 7.2% and year to date through August 2016 is 4.5%.
Given the success of CenteringPregnancy, Grace Health will soon be starting CenteringParenting. CenteringParenting begins after the baby is born, recognizes the importance of mom’s and baby’s health, and keeps parents engaged in their child’s care.
