Auburn students aren’t the only ones with grades on their minds these days.
In its first Premature Birth Report Card, the March of Dimes gave Alabama an ‘F’ for having a premature birth rate of 16.7 percent.
Alabama is ranked 50th in the U.S. for having such a high pre-term birth rate.
Only Mississippi and Puerto Rico, with 18.8 and 19.7 percent, respectively, were ranked lower.
The nation as a whole is not doing much better, as the U.S. received a ‘D,’ with no states receiving an ‘A,’ and only one, Vermont, receiving a ‘B.’
“I was aware of Alabama’s preemie rate (before the report card was published),” said Dr. Albert Holloway, a pediatric doctor practicing in Montgomery. “It does not come as a surprise.”
Holloway is the president of the Alabama chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics. He is also on the Regional Perinatal Advisory Council, and was already familiar with the topics highlighted in the March of Dimes’ report.
“The three things they looked at to give us our grade are percent of smoking, percent of uninsured and percent of late pre-term births,” Holloway said.
Holloway said late pre-term births are those between 35 and 37 weeks.
According to the report, 19.7 percent, or one in five, women of childbearing age in Alabama has no health insurance coverage. One in four, or 23.2 percent, women of childbearing age in Alabama smokes tobacco.
And 11.5 percent, or approximately one in nine, live births are late pre-term, which are connected to induced labor and Cesarean sections between 34 weeks and full term.
“The problem with pre-term births is it is a multi-sectoral problem — so there is no one thing that we know of at this time that will prevent it,” said Robin Allison Collins, a representative for the March of Dimes of Alabama. “So what we can do is reduce risk, and here in Alabama, that’s looking at smoking, lack of insurance, obesity, extremes of age and other controllable things.”
Pre-term birth is the leading cause of death in the first month of life in the U.S.
The pre-term birth rate has increased more than 20 percent since 1990 and costs the nation more than $26 billion a year, according to the Institute of Medicine report issued in July 2006.
Solutions to the premature birth rate in Alabama and the U.S. are coming along, but aren’t always enough.
“There are studies showing that if you can get mothers who have had a late pre-term delivery, provide them some intense case management, we can reduce the risk of them having a second,” Holloway said.
Collins wants to see more done on the business and federal level.
“A lot of young women get their first jobs, and depending on the size of the organization, they may not have insurance at all,” Collins said. “If they’re married, their spouse’s insurance through their job may only cover the employee — not her.”
The March of Dimes chose to focus on the three risk factors of insurance, smoking and late pre-term deliveries in its report because those things can be impacted with a breakthrough in science.
“We put these reports together because we realized that while we and folks who work in maternal child health have access to all of this information, the general public and the business owners who make the decisions about what kind of insurance to invest in, and smoking policies, are not aware of the seriousness of premature births,” Collins said.
Holloway wants everyone to start doing their part to help solve this issue.
“This is something that affects all of us,” Holloway said. “Not just the uninsured.”
