In 1981, a woman was born prematurely at UC San Diego Medical Center in Hillcrest. She received life-saving care from a multidisciplinary team. Forty-one years later, she returned to the same hospital system— UC San Diego Health—to deliver her own premature twins at Jacobs Medical Center in La Jolla.
The infants received the most advanced and specialized neonatal care in the region’s only academic medical center, just like their mother did more than four decades earlier. The twin daughters were discharged after 107 days in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) and continue to grow and thrive.
Care for parents and infants, such as the services at UC San Diego Health, is a hallmark of UC’s academic health system.
UC Health provides compassionate and comprehensive maternal health care services
UC academic health centers deliver high-quality, compassionate, comprehensive maternal care spanning the entire pregnancy journey — from prenatal care to postpartum support and everything in between.
For example, having a nationally recognized neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) isn’t the only maternal health care service UC San Diego Health offers. Like other UC academic health centers, UC San Diego Health offers a broad array of pregnancy and childbirth programs, including comprehensive prenatal diabetes care and postpartum care and support, such as the Pelvic Health After Birth Clinic to help patients with complex conditions.
UC academic health centers offer maternal health care services, including:
- Access to a team of compassionate maternal care providers, including OB/GYNs, family medicine physicians and high-risk specialists who work with expectant mothers and parents to develop an individualized birth plan. Certified nurse-midwives are available at most UC academic health centers.
- Coordinated prenatal care, including prenatal testing, screening and genetic counseling. Many UC academic health centers also offer programs to help mitigate chronic diseases like diabetes and hypertension management.
- Birth centers and labor and delivery units for maternity care and childbirth.
- Pregnancy doulas are welcomed as part of a mother’s care team and are available at many UC academic health centers.
- Education classes on topics such as preparing for childbirth and breastfeeding.
- Breast/chestfeeding support and lactation consultations, with many UC academic health centers also offering breast pumps for rent.
- Postpartum care and services, including pelvic floor health support.
- Specialized care for high-risk pregnancies as well as access to subspecialists.
- NICUs that are level III or IV, which provide the highest-level care.
All UC academic health centers are also designated Baby Friendly hospitals.
Expanding maternal health care access and prenatal education in the San Joaquin Valley and Inland Empire
UC academic health centers are committed to providing high-quality, compassionate obstetric and gynecological services and continually work to expand access to this life-saving care—especially in historically under-resourced areas. For example, just last year, UC Davis Health opened a new Stockton clinic for patients with high-risk pregnancies. The new location, which is part of the UC Davis Fetal Care and Treatment Center, will triple patient capacity and provide prenatal care through counseling, genetic screening, and diagnostic testing for fetal anomalies.
A similar principle for expanding maternal health care and prenatal education holds true at UCR Health. Brenda Ross, M.D., a maternal-fetal medicine specialist at UCR Health with a background in caring for expecting mothers who are HIV-positive, has been working to make services more accessible for pregnant women in the Inland Empire. Crucial to that, she says, is the role of education in prenatal care, especially for patients with chronic conditions like diabetes.
“Well-informed patients can stand in their power and proclaim the expectation of superb healthcare from well-informed providers,” Dr. Ross explains. "I focus on motivating patients who have diabetes to exercise their power to impact the pregnancy outcome by making sure that they follow the recommended diet regimen, exercise regularly, and keep their blood glucose levels under control.”
By ensuring that patients can access services and critical prenatal education, UC Health helps individuals navigate the complexities of pregnancy, delivery and postpartum, empowering them to make decisions that lead to healthier pregnancies and positive outcomes.
UC Health is there when complications arise
All UC academic health centers are equipped to handle high-risk pregnancies, ensuring that patients receive high-quality care even in cases of complications. For instance, the UCI Health high-risk obstetrics program offers comprehensive, coordinated care to help protect both mother and child during pregnancy, delivery and after.
UCI Medical Center is the only facility in Orange County offering specialized care in one location for high-risk expectant mothers and their babies. The program includes a multi-disciplinary approach, with a large team of in-house physician specialists, including those dedicated to understanding maternal cardiac disease and morbidity while working to identify gaps in care. Through the UC academic care model, patients have access to additional subspecialists, if needed, including more than 55 types of pediatric subspecialists, like Afshan B. Hameed, MD.
Dr. Hameed focuses on maternal cardiac disease, and her goal is to eliminate preventable causes of maternal morbidity and mortality. She currently leads four active projects exploring the relationship between cardiac disease and pregnancy, with a focus on heart failure, valvular disease, and anticoagulation. She serves on the California Maternal Quality Care Collaborative (CMQCC) Pregnancy-Associated Mortality Review Advisory Committee, reviewing maternal mortality cases to identify care gaps for quality improvement. She contributed to the development of CMQCC's cardiovascular and venous thromboembolism toolkits and the ACOG's 2019 Practice Bulletin on Heart Disease in Pregnancy.
A commitment to equitable, whole-person maternal health care, including mental health
UC academic health centers are committed to providing maternal health care to meet the specific health needs of mothers, newborns and families. UCSF Health offers a variety of perinatal resources for patients throughout their pregnancy, delivery, and postpartum, such as the UCSF EMBRACE program. The clinical program is “developed to give Black mothers and Black pregnant people an opportunity to receive prenatal care from an intentional angle of racial consciousness.” Since the program's inception in 2018, more than eight race-concordant, culturally affirming services have been offered in partnership with community-based organizations, such as lactation education, linkages to support groups and postpartum mental health services.
UC academic health centers are proud to offer compassionate, whole-person postpartum care and referrals to supportive services. At UCLA Health, mental health care, for example, is integrated within its obstetric practices. Using a whole-person approach to care, the UCLA Health Maternal Outpatient Mental health Services (MOMS) Clinic serves the mental health needs of women during the perinatal period. Offering care up to one year postpartum, the MOMS Clinic offers full psychiatric assessments and tailored mental health resources, including referrals to pelvic floor physical therapists and support groups, to help support new moms, babies and families.
Our commitment to maternal and child health equity
At UC Health, we recognize that supporting new parents and infants doesn’t end at delivery. In addition to providing comprehensive, whole-person maternal health care at every stage of pregnancy, the UC Health Milk Bank, operated by UC San Diego Health, provides donor milk to parents and babies in need, both at the NICU and at home.
Earlier this year, the University of California sponsored legislation—AB 3059—to increase access to medically necessary donor milk. Donated by lactating mothers, donor milk is pasteurized and distributed by the UC Health Milk Bank, one of only three milk banks in California. Authored by Assemblymember Weber, the bill, which was signed into law by Governor Newsom and goes into effect in January 2025, will mean that more families can access the life-saving nutrition source.
About University of California Health
University of California Health comprises six academic health centers, 21 health professional schools, a Global Health Institute and systemwide services that improve the health of patients and the University’s students, faculty and employees. All of UC’s hospitals are ranked among the best in California and its medical schools and health professional schools are nationally ranked in their respective areas.