Reported by Christine Webb

ORLANDO -- The Orange County Health Department is introducing its new Certified Nurse Midwife Program.

The service, a first at the health department, has helped deliver at least 89 healthy babies at Health Central Hospital.

The program has had a very low Cesarean section rate of less than 10 percent for 2009, and a very low percentage of low birth weight babies.

“This is so important, because a lot of these women do not have access to prenatal care, let alone knowing what obstetrician will deliver their baby,” So for these women, they don’t have to worry about the insurance side, or the Medicaid side of it.”

The midwife program began in October 2008 as a partnership between Health Central Hospital and the health department to address infant mortality rates and the critical need for more healthcare workers to deliver babies, especially for underinsured or uninsured low risk pregnant women in west Orange County.

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