Congressman Andy Barr Speaks with PATHways Staff at Polk-Dalton Clinic
Congressman Andy Barr (KY-06) visited the Polk-Dalton Clinic on Monday, May 7, to speak with PATHways staff about the comprehensive opioid maintenance treatment program for pregnant women recovering from addiction.
The PATHways program began as a prenatal care initiative of the College of Nursing. Women with substance use disorders were provided group-led nursing care in conjunction with their medical appointments. Facilitated groups allowed the women to explore their pregnancy along with making plans for their future, including family planning, birth control options, breastfeeding planning and introduction to infant soothing techniques. With traditional OB care, we then planned to see patients up to their 6 week postpartum appointments with plans to then refer them to other recovery programs to continue to work on their substance use disorders.
“We quickly realized that not only were there very few programs to refer our patients to, but that the patients had become very invested in their recovery process within our program,” says Kristin Ashford, PhD, APRN, WHNP-BC, FAAN, associate dean of undergraduate faculty affairs and IPE and director of the Perinatal Research and Wellness Center. “It did not take long to discover we were onto something meaningful for our patients, so we simply began to do what we thought was ‘the next best thing’ for our moms and babies.”
