Earlier this year, the Rural Maternity Care Summit meeting was convened with the goal of identifying the site and leadership characteristics of six rural communities that have been successful in maintaining high-quality, accessible rural maternity care access. The six sites vary in geographic location and size but share many characteristics.
One is leadership that recognizes the community and economic value of maintaining maternity care. Another is a workforce model that prioritizes and recognizes and supports the pivotal importance of full-scope Family Medicine physicians either as the sole maternity care clinicians or in partnership with OBGyn and midwives.
Mark Deutchman, MD, is one of the authors on site and leadership reports for this summit. Both reports can be viewed on the Rural Health Information Hub website. Starting on page 28 you will find the “lessons learned” in common from the study. The leader report focuses on evidence learned from study of the sites and the practical implications of that evidence.