Terri Clark-Coller says midwives are getting a bad rap.
The borough's obstetrics community was rocked last week by a series in the ®MDUL¯New York Times®MDNM¯ that said poor women were receiving substandard care before, during and after childbirth.
"The damage is tremendous," said Clark-Coller, the only midwife at Bronx Lebanon Hospital's Family Practice Center. "My patients are looking at me like, `Are you one of them?' As it was, midwives were working an uphill battle."
Midwives are nurses who receive additional training to provide prenatal care and to deliver babies. They have written agreements with doctors and call on them during care. The number of midwives, who were once limited largely to home births, has grown in the past two decades, and they attended nearly 116,000 in-hospital births in 1988.
Of the 4,000 midwives nationwide, about 50 work in the borough, according to Clark-Coller.
®MDBU¯®MDNM¯"This is what most midwives do -- they go serve in underserved areas thinking they can help solve the problems," said Clark-Coller, who commutes 70 miles from [a home in] Connecticut. "Now, it appears we are the problem."
Talking rapidly with her voice raised, Clark-Coller rattled off issues and facts that were not addressed in the series, like the benefits of maternal care given by midwives as well as the positive effects of fewer caesarean births.
She said she respects the midwives accused of inadequate care in the ®MDUL¯Times®MDNM¯, and believes a Department of Health investigation will absolve them.
Dr. John Weiser, medical director of Crotona Park Family Practice Center in Morrisania, moved to the South Bronx from the predominantly white city of Minneapolis last year. He hadn't delivered a baby for several years in family practice and felt a refresher would help. He took a residency in December with North Bronx Central Hospital's Obstetrics Department, a program chastised in several ®MDUL¯Times ®MDNM¯articles.
"I was very surprised with the New York Times' treatment." said Weiser. "I am in total support of their program. The deliveries I participated in were women-centered, calm and well taken care of, with doctors readily available."
While many midwives are still bewildered by the articles, Clark-Coller likens the motives to a detective story. "Mayor Guiliani wants to sell city hospitals," she said. "Montefiore wants to buy out North Bronx Central. Obstetricians want more deliveries and midwives are a thorn in their side."
One of Clark-Coller's patients, Regina, delivered her seventh baby Thursday under the midwife's care.
Standing in the doorway of her hospital room, Regina embraced the woman she calls "Miss Terry.''
"I've never had such a doctor work with me," Regina, who looks younger than her 39 years, said as she waited for her baby boy to be brought to the room.
When Regina's baby was brought to her, she patted the six-pounder's tiny back and kissed his forehead. Regina has a history of low birth-weight babies. She also has syphillis, so her baby must receive a 10-day treatment to prevent transmission.
Clark-Coller said cases like Regina's are not unusual, and nurse-midwives feel adequately trained to handle the required care.
"Nurse-midwives are not ignorant, untrained and loose cannons on the deck," she said.