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BY FRANK DELANO
What is now a field of grass may become the birthplace of hundreds of Northern Neck children in years to come.
If all goes as planned, bids will be sought next month for the construction of a $1.6 million birthing center on the 2-acre site in Lancaster County, said Shirley C. Dodson-McAdoo, executive director of the nonprofit Family Maternity Center of the Northern Neck Inc.
"The center will restore birth services to families in the Northern Neck by using an innovative model of care," she said.
When the 6,000-square-foot building is completed, Dodson-McAdoo expects 45 babies to be born there in its first year of operation. She predicts about 150 babies a year will be born at the center after five years.
She said the center will employ three nurse midwives. It will limit its practice to low-risk births by women who have participated in prenatal care.
Surgery and anesthesia, such as cesarean sections and epidurals, will not be performed at the center.
"Women were made for having babies," said Dodson-McAdoo. "But a lot of women are concerned about delivering babies in hospitals because of the risks of infection, the effects of medications and being left alone in a bed in a room at the end of a hall.
"The new center will be a home-like facility. For moms and babies, it will be friendlier, safer and healthier environment than a hospital," she said. "But we want physicians to work together with the midwives."
To that end, the center will establish high-tech links with doctors at the Virginia Commonwealth University Medical Center in Richmond that will enable them to participate in exams and view patient records, Dodson-McAdoo said.
The opening of the birthing center will come five years after Rappahannock General Hospital in Kilmarnock closed its labor and delivery rooms in 2004. About 250 babies were born at the hospital each year.
Since then, expectant mothers on the isolated, rural Northern Neck peninsula have driven an hour or more to delivery rooms in Newport News, Richmond or Fredericksburg.
The closing of obstetrical units at Kilmarnock and five other small-town hospitals prompted the state to authorize a pilot program to test the birthing-center concept in rural communities. The program has given the Northern Neck center $150,000 to develop its plans.
The late Rep. Jo Ann Davis, whose congressional district included the Northern Neck, obtained a $190,000 earmark appropriation for the center.
According to the American Association of Birthing Centers, there are 195 centers in the United States, including three in Virginia.
Most of the funding for the new building will come from a U.S. Department of Agriculture's loan program for rural health clinics in medically under-served localities, Dodson-McAdoo said. Part of the loan package will include a $50,000 grant to the center, she said.
Community support for the center has been strong. A donor who wishes to remain anonymous bought and donated the site where the center will be built. Some church groups are busy making blankets and other baby items.
Nevertheless, Dodson-McAdoo said, "We need everyone to come on board and help us.
"We've applied for several grants, but we'd like to get some money from the state and the county," she said. "We still need a trench dug and a T-3 telephone line for the Internet."
Frank Delano: 804/333-3834
Email: fpdelano@gmail.com
