Lee Grossman interviews Dr. Jeanne Conry at the Forum Institute Think Tank, September 21, 2018.
Dr. Conry is assistant physician in chief at The Permanente Medical Group in Roseville, CA, and associate clinical professor of ob-gyn at the University of California, Davis. She has been a practicing ob-gyn with The Permanente Medical Group for more than 20 years. Dr. Conry was ACOG President May 2013–May 2014.

Transcript

 Hi there, this is Lee Grossman. We're in Atlanta, Georgia at the Forum Institute think-tank on toxicity and health, which we just completed. And one of the participants there was Dr. Jeanne Conry. Dr. Conry had presented some very interesting information about a study that was conducted in California that dramatically reduced maternal mortality. And just wanted to ask her a few questions about that study so that she can review it, because it not only was substantial and significant in California, but it has tremendous opportunities to significantly reduce and improve those outcomes throughout the country. Could you tell us a little bit about that study?

Surely, it's been a whole host of different things that we've done. We started looking at this around 2006, 2008, and realized that we needed a systematic approach to taking care of women on labor and delivery. And out of that analysis, number one, looking at the causes of maternal deaths so we honestly knew what were the factors that were contributing to women dying in labor, postpartum. We realized that we needed much better, much more well-constructed bundles of care. For example, a woman who died because of a hemorrhage. How do we take care of her in the most optimum way? A woman who has elevated blood pressure. How do we take care of her and make sure that we're treating her best? Or a woman who has a blood clot.

What are the percentages of maternal mortality in the US and in California?

We've seen the numbers drop. California was heading up to about 19 per 100,000, in terms of maternal mortality rate. The United States is up around 23. And now we've dropped our numbers down to 6 in the state of California. So, a precipitous decline just because of a host of different things. Like I said, number one is the collaborative approach, working with a number of health systems. Physicians, physician leaders, nurses, and midwives have been a great partnership for us, so making sure that we had collaboration with everybody. And then strategically working with those hospitals. We also started inter-conception care, so how do we optimize a woman's health before, between, and then beyond pregnancy? You know Lee, I have to give credit to the California Maternal Quality Care Collaborative. That group took together the experts across the state, analyzed the maternal deaths, and then has rolled out all of the work that we've done in California. It's an incredibly powerful group, very dedicated individuals that have really made the difference in California.

Where can people get information about this?

Couple different sources. ACOG, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, has a wonderful resource that's called the Patient Safety Council, and they've got an alliance on innovations in maternal health. That alliance summarizes all of this work and is in fact showing how we're rolling it out to a number of other states across the United States. We've had fabulous support in California with the California Department of Public Health, and then across the United States. The Health Resources Services Agency saying, "This is a critical moment for all of us in time. "We need to put our funds here."

Well, your results in California are just terrific. And hopefully, we'll be able to have this spread throughout the country so that other states can experience the same benefit you have. Wanna thank you for your work, and for talking to us today. Thank you very much.

Thank you so much. I appreciate it and look forward to more active involvement.

Okay, thank you.

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