Dear Friends:
I am working as a mother/baby nurse with a woman whose baby was in NICU.
She wanted to breastfeed at our first visit, and was pumping and spending as
much time as possible in the NICU. She has hypertension that appeared at
the end of the pregnancy, and led to the cesarean section.
My second visit was a few days ago, to see her and the baby. She has
abandoned breastfeeding because of too much stress and her blood pressure. In
her case, I can understand why.
She has seen many different doctors during this past month; because she
is poor, she goes to a clinic. Her primary doctor told her that he wasn't
going to increase her medicine, because the kind of blood pressure she has will
go away at 6 weeks postpartum!
Can you believe this? So she's supposed to walk around for the next
month with 160/110??? Sure, her hypertension might resolve at 6 weeks; she could
be dead then too! That is one way to make blood pressure better.
Another doctor at the next visit told her to stop taking the medication;
because it wasn't working. He didn't prescribe anything either. When I made
the home visit, and her pressure was 160/100, I called the doctor on call.
This doctor told me that the patient was "non-compliant" because she had
stopped taking her medicine; he didn't know, or didn't have the chart, to realize
that the doctor before him had told her to do that.
Meanwhile this poor woman now has headaches, and is very reluctant to
rush back to the hospital for care because the attention and care she receives
is so confusing, rude and disconnected.
She and her husband are as poor as church mice, have only just gotten a
bed (that someone gave them), have only 3 chairs. Her tiny apartment is
spotless. She has followed every direction given to her all along the way. She
will go to the clinic today, after resting all weekend.
This is the state of common, ordinary health care in the US.
Heaven help us.
warmly,
Nikki Lee RN, MS, Mother of 2, IBCLC, CCE
Maternal-Child Adjunct Faculty Union Institute and University
Film Reviews Editor, Journal of Human Lactation
Support the WHO Code and the Mother-Friendly Childbirth Initiative
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