Carle Illinois College of Medicine students are training to help improve pregnancy outcomes in medically underserved communities. They’re training as doulas – lay pregnancy workers who offer non-medical support that can help reverse high maternal and infant mortality rates in marginalized communities.
For the next year, CI MED students Diamond Ruby Coleman, Annie Tigranyan, and Khirsen Corbins will join CI MED Professor Imanni Sheppard in learning techniques and strategies for providing personalized care that complements clinical pregnancy care. “A doula provides pregnant women with non-medical, holistic support via emotional, physical, and informational resources during their pregnancies, during labor, and throughout each aspect of the postpartum period,” Sheppard explained.
Improving the birthing experience and helping address high maternal and infant mortality rates, especially among African American, American Indian, and Alaska Native (AIAN) women and children is among the big-picture goals of the doula training. “Research has shown that doulas help to improve health outcomes by abating the frequency of postpartum depression/postpartum anxiety (PPD/PPA), reducing the risk of low birth weight, acting as patient advocates, increasing breastfeeding success, augmenting prenatal care and postnatal observations, and reducing the frequency of premature labor,” Sheppard said.
As part of their training, CI MED students are connecting with a community member who has experienced pregnancy and learn the types of support that person would have liked to have received to improve their pregnancy experience.
“I am motivated to learn the stories and history of why African American, American Native, and Alaska Native women have been subjected to the challenges of childbirth in a society that has all the medicine and technology to ensure equitable outcomes but falls drastically short,” Tigranyan said. “As a mom to three, I know firsthand how pregnancy and childbirth can be challenging and painful. Women need a voice and hands-on advocates to help them work through the pain while ensuring the clinical team meets their needs. For me, becoming a doula is the first step.”
Once they are certified doulas, the CI MED participants will be able to train others in the community to provide doula services, expanding the potential positive impact. “It's letting community members on the ground know that there are practical ways that you can combat this high disproportionate maternity morbidity and mortality rate among African American populations, and it also gives the medical community, including students and physicians, the tools to do the same,” Coleman said. She and Tigranyan both plan to expand their work with the doula program into research projects that add to the body of knowledge on birthing outcomes.
Sheppard developed the CEE-DOULA Training (Critical Engagement of Equity to improve the health outcomes for African American families) program through a community partnership with BIPOC for Better Birth, the Medical Humanities and Health Disparities Institute, and funding from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign’s Humanities Research Institute (HRI).
“This will not only make our students better physicians, but it will also make our community members more informed patients/patient advocates,” Sheppard said.