Program supports pregnant women facing addiction

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MADISON, Wis. (AP) — A new pilot program in southern Wisconsin is offering help for women who are pregnant and are dealing with substance abuse.

SSM Health and Safe Communities of Madison-Dane County have partnered together to create the Pregnancy2Recovery program in Dane County, Wisconsin Public Radio reported. It launched at Safe Communities in August, and the partnership was finalized in December.

Four women have enrolled in the program so far, said Tanya Kraege, a recovery coach supervisor at Safe Communities.

The program connects pregnant women struggling with substance abuse with a recovery coach, who have also experienced drug or alcohol addiction during a pregnancy. Coaches help women find the support they need, such as medication assisted treatment.

“It’s a very sensitive issue,” she said. “It’s even more so, I believe, for … people who are pregnant because there’s a greater stigma on women who are pregnant than there is for a different type of person in active addiction. And so there’s even a larger barrier that we have to overcome.”

Women who take opioids during their pregnancy can have preterm births. The babies can suffer from a variety of health issues including neonatal opioid withdrawal syndrome.

But women taking opioids while pregnant shouldn’t just stop, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said.

“In some cases, avoiding or stopping medication use during pregnancy may be more harmful than taking it,” according to the CDC.

The program continues to offer support after the baby is born, Kraege said.

“That’s a critical time for people who struggle with opiate use disorder to relapse, whether it be from … feelings that they’re having about postpartum, feelings that they’re having about having watched their child go through neonatal abstinence syndrome, or maybe their prescribed pain medication because they had a cesarean or just general labor pains that come along with that as well,” Kraege said.