A Raleigh-based health center works to reduce rates of Black maternal and infant deaths

Dr. Lisa Vendeland, director of OBGYN and women’s services at Advance Community Health (Photo: Advance Community Health) A Raleigh-based community health center that low-income and uninsured people have relied on for decades is opening an OBGYN clinic with the intention of addressing, head-on, the factors that have Black mothers and babies dying at higher rates than white mothers and infants.  Services for expectant parents at Advance Community Health will feature a type of group prenatal care that’s been credited with reducing rates of preterm births. The center is also starting a parenting program for fathers.  Dr. Lisa Vendeland, the director Obstetrics, Gynecology & Women’s Services at Advance, is heading up OBGYN service with a team that includes a nurse, nurse practitioners, a dietician, and social workers.  Offering expansive prenatal services and parent support is a deliberate effort to lower rates of infant and maternal death in communities of color.  These deaths “just shouldn’t be happening,” Vendeland said.  State healthcare leaders, providers, and community health groups have been talking for years about the state’s high infant and maternal mortality rates and how Black people are hit the hardest. Reducing infant mortality rates and reducing the gap between Black and white survival...