In 2022, Independence Blue Cross (IBX) started working with Cayaba Care to assist enhance maternal well being outcomes for our most at-risk members, notably Black and Brown folks. Cayaba supplies help for folks throughout and after being pregnant, to assist them overcome a number of the challenges that improve their danger of maternal morbidity and mortality.
In 2024, Dr. Adaeze Enekwechi joined Cayaba as the corporate’s new Chief Govt Officer. Just lately, I sat down along with her to ask concerning the imaginative and prescient and methods she has for Cayaba, and I’d prefer to share highlights from our dialog.
Selling Equitable Maternal Care
Dr. Ross: Inform us about your background and your curiosity in maternal well being.
Dr. Enekwechi: I’m a well being coverage and economics skilled by background. Along with working within the personal sector, I spent a few years in authorities, together with serving as head of well being applications for President Obama on the White Home Workplace of Administration and Price range. I’ve spent my profession ensuring assets are being spent and directed in ways in which finally make a distinction in folks’s well being and well-being.
With regards to maternal well being outcomes, I’ve stopped quoting statistics on how badly the USA is doing. Suffice it to say, it’s shameful {that a} nation this rich is performing as poorly on this space as creating international locations.
And a number of the most weak persons are girls who appear to be me. Typically it doesn’t even matter what their earnings and schooling ranges are, so long as they’re Black or Brown.
Personally, I do know this wrestle from each perspective — by my direct expertise, my work, and my schooling. And I’m simply as terrified of those unhealthy outcomes as anyone else. So it’s an honor to have a possibility to attempt to remedy this enormous challenge with Cayaba.
Dr. Ross: What are the challenges folks of colour face in accessing equitable maternity care?
Dr. Enekwechi: Whenever you’re an individual of colour, in some methods the well being care system is simply not outfitted to listen to you. We name this implicit bias…however generally it’s not implicit, it’s simply plain bias. It’s express.
Even Black girls physicians typically report being actively dismissed, ignored, and gaslit after they have well being points — though they really have the medical coaching to articulate what they’re experiencing in phrases that different suppliers perceive. So think about how it’s for somebody who doesn’t have the vocabulary to explain their well being issues!
Typically you simply want somebody to inform you that every thing goes to be okay. However Black girls inform me, “No person ever thinks to say that to me.”
Establishing Belief Is the “Secret Sauce”
Dr. Ross: How is Cayaba addressing these challenges?
Dr. Enekwechi: Efficient well being care finally comes all the way down to a few issues. It’s native, it’s based mostly on belief, and it’s based mostly on empathy.
That’s what Cayaba’s Maternity Navigators convey. They’re intentionally employed from the communities they serve. So our purchasers really feel like they’re speaking to somebody who hears them, can join with them, and, importantly, offers them company, helps them body their questions as they work together with their obstetrician.
However Cayaba supplies much more — like lactation consulting. Just lately a person instructed me, “After my spouse had her child, having a lactation advisor wasn’t simply help — it was a psychological well being intervention.” These new mother and father based mostly their complete self-worth on having the ability to breastfeed their child. And since their child wasn’t capable of latch on and wasn’t feeding, issues began to go awry fairly shortly. We had been fast to intervene earlier than issues acquired worse, and it helped the dad in addition to the mother. Lactation help meant every thing to them.
We additionally make sturdy medical tools very simply accessible, like breast pumps. The place applicable, we equip our purchasers with blood strain cuffs, prepare them in utilizing them, present them how you can file their readings. We educate them how you can actually deal with themselves in ways in which most of us could not be taught at house.
Dr. Ross: How does Cayaba choose its workers?
Dr. Enekwechi: We rent folks from the group, medical assistants and group well being staff, and prepare them within the Cayaba Care mannequin. Our Maternity Navigators are all doula-certified — we facilitate that coaching. However we additionally display them for empathy. The folks we rent for these roles communicate the language of these they’re caring for, they perceive them.
The critiques we get from individuals who work with our Maternity Navigators say, “I trusted her. She trusted me. She held my hand. She was by no means condescending. She revered me.”
That’s what we convey. That’s our secret sauce.
Going The place the Want Is Best
Dr. Ross: How does Cayaba work with suppliers like obstetricians, midwives, and nurse practitioners?
Dr. Enekwechi: We’re in Philadelphia, the place many individuals giving beginning are at excessive danger for poor outcomes, and we discuss with well being care suppliers. Suppliers are our companions; they refer their sufferers, we share knowledge with them, we’ve got an lively partnership with them. Supplier practices know their sufferers might use wrap-around providers and help. We present them that we might help forestall NICU visits, maternal morbidity and mortality, and preterm deliveries. We have now the info to again that up; we’ve got actual proof.
Our form of help shouldn’t be one thing pregnant persons are accustomed to as a result of it normally doesn’t exist. We’d like our suppliers to inform them, “Hey, discuss to Cayaba. Interact with them and see. This may very well be fairly helpful to you.”
Dr. Ross: What are your fast and long-term objectives for Cayaba?
Dr. Enekwechi: I don’t need anybody who might be working with us to not be working with us. That’s my aim. There are too many ladies we all know, too many individuals and households, that might vastly profit from Cayaba’s help. And so they deserve it. That’s my massive aim, to serve all of the folks and households we must be supporting. I additionally need to deepen and develop our partnership with IBX, and serve our members over an extended time period as a member of this group.
Unfold the Phrase
Well being outcomes are unacceptably poor for pregnant folks of colour. That’s who’s on the at highest danger for poor outcomes. We strongly encourage them to reap the benefits of this service, which is obtainable for gratis to IBX members, in addition to our different maternal well being assets and providers.
In case you, or somebody , may profit from this type of help, please contact Cayaba. Everybody deserves the absolute best probability of a wholesome and profitable being pregnant, supply, and postpartum interval.
