To provide additional maternity care and a full spectrum of birthing experience options for patients, Vanderbilt University Medical Center has announced plans to acquire the Nashville location of Baby+Company, a freestanding birthing center that emphasizes a family-centered, low-intervention approach to delivery for uncomplicated pregnancies.

Hearing that she could deliver her second child with no out-of-pocket expense convinced Vanderbilt University Medical Center employee Amy New to enroll in the new MyMaternityHealth Bundle offered by Vanderbilt Health, and she quickly learned the program’s advantages didn’t stop there.

The Vanderbilt Maternal Addiction Recovery Program is participating in a 12-site clinical trial that will compare two forms of the medication buprenorphine in treating opioid use disorder during pregnancy, and the results could have a potentially significant impact on clinical practice.

The Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology recently kicked off the first phase of renovations for the Labor and Delivery unit. Staff from the department helped “retire” the wallpaper in the current delivery rooms by tearing it off the walls.

Most women who undergo a cesarean section are sent home with more opioids than they need, but a significant proportion of women use all opioids and report unmet pain needs, according to Sarah Osmundson, MD, MS, assistant professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology.

Women who consume alcohol during pregnancy — even in small amounts — have a 19% greater risk of miscarriage than women who don’t use alcohol.

A 19-year-old student is leading a multi-institutional collaboration to identify drugs that can be prescribed safely to pregnant women without harming the fetus.