{"id":27693,"date":"2020-02-26T16:48:49","date_gmt":"2020-02-26T22:48:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/?p=27693"},"modified":"2020-02-26T16:59:44","modified_gmt":"2020-02-26T22:59:44","slug":"maternal-health-care-changes-sought","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/?p=27693","title":{"rendered":"Maternal health care changes sought"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Health and Human Services Committee considered a bill Feb. 26 that would makes several changes to state law regarding health care delivery for pregnant women and new mothers.<\/p>\n

\"Sen.
Sen. Machaela Cavanaugh<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

LB1170, introduced by Omaha Sen. Machaela Cavanaugh, would:
\n\u2022 extend Medicaid postpartum coverage from 60 days to one year;
\n\u2022 expand Medicaid coverage to include the services of a doula\u2014a non-medical professional who assists a pregnant woman during and after labor;
\n\u2022 require the state Department of Health and Human Services to develop and provide instruction to all health care professionals regarding health screenings for maternal hypertension, gestational diabetes and obesity;
\n\u2022 require all individuals licensed or credentialed under the Uniform Credentialing Act to complete implicit bias training approved by DHHS; and
\n\u2022 create a pilot program to study racial disparity across socioeconomic groups and social determinants of health for pregnant women and mothers.<\/p>\n

Cavanaugh said maternal mortality rates have risen in the United States at a time when it is declining in the rest of the world.<\/p>\n

\u201cAfrican American women have borne the brunt of this,\u201d she said. \u201cIt is not the education or the financial background of the mother that is the problem, it is society\u2019s bias in our health care system.\u201d<\/p>\n

Julia Isaacs Tse of Voices for Children in Nebraska testified in support of the bill. She said black and Native American mothers have a much higher mortality rate than do white mothers.<\/p>\n

\u201cHealth disparities for women of color are the result of a range of systematic barriers that have deep, historical roots in our nation that include [lack of access] to reproductive health care, exposure to chronic stress well before that woman becomes pregnant and the availability of quality hospitals in communities of color,\u201d Isaacs Tse said.<\/p>\n

Also speaking in support was Becky Sherman of Doulas of Lincoln. She said she has assisted mothers in more than 80 births and employed a doula for the birth of her own children. Doulas act as advocates for mothers and enhance communication between a health care provider and a pregnant woman, Sherman said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe presence of a doula reduces the need for interventions, pain-relief medications, instrument delivery and caesarean delivery,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Jeremy Brunssen, interim director of the DHHS Division of Medicaid and Long-Term Care, testified against the bill. He said DHHS does not oppose creating implicit bias training, although it would increase the department\u2019s costs.<\/p>\n

The department does oppose changing Medicaid requirements, Brunssen said. He said the current, 60-day postpartum Medicaid coverage period is a federal requirement and that changing it would require the state to seek a waiver.<\/p>\n

\u201cLB1170 would change Medicaid eligibility for pregnant women in a way that goes beyond federal law and will not allow the state to maximize federal funding,\u201d Brunssen said.<\/p>\n

The committee took no immediate action on the bill.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Health and Human Services Committee considered a bill Feb. 26 that would makes several changes to state law regarding health care delivery for pregnant women and new mothers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[12],"tags":[248],"class_list":["post-27693","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-health-and-human-services","tag-sen-machaela-cavanaugh"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27693","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=27693"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27693\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27703,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27693\/revisions\/27703"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=27693"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=27693"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=27693"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}