The number of births at Kaweah Health in Visalia were down in the Covid years, but now have recovered to an average of over 400 monthly. Figures for July show 409 deliveries.
Perhaps impacting the number is the fact that Tulare Adventist Hospital has now closed their OB/GYN service, Just announced Family HealthCare Network will no longer route their patients to Hanford’s Adventist Health hospital for deliveries.
Kaweah Health administrator Marc Mertz says that Tulare Adventist volumes were quite low,some six deliveries a month, so” that impact given our monthly volume of over 400 will be relatively small”. Regarding the news from FHCN that change “was effective as of September 1 so it is too soon to tell how that will impact us.”
During the Colvid years through the end of 2021 the early months of the U.S. pandemic were associated with a drop in births, leading to an overall” baby bust” on the order of 100,000 fewer births that would have occurred based on pre-pandemic trends.
At Kaweah Health, the Covid quarantine has led to a decline of about 20% in the number of births at Kaweah Delta in 2020 compared to 2019. As of December 2020, the hospital reported 342 deliveries compared to 415 in December 2019 — the same trend seen every month in the past year.
Now the normal pattern has returned.
“We will continue to monitor delivery volumes closely, and we will take the necessary steps to ensure that Kaweah Health is very well prepared to provide all expectant mothers in Tulare and Kings Counties with excellent maternal care. We have a sufficient number of patient rooms to handle a higher volume of deliveries, and we will increase staffing levels and physician coverage as necessary.”
Kaweah Health’s Family Birthing Center provides maternity and infant health care. It offers the community a 21-bed labor and delivery unit, a 42-bed postpartum unit, the largest labor/delivery triage area in Tulare County with anesthesiologists, Maternal-Fetal Medicine Specialists for high-risk deliveries and a Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) staffed by physicians from Valley Children’s Medical Group. Kaweah Health’s NICU is community designated by California Children’s Services as providing care for infants as early as 26-weeks gestation and has a neonatologist and pediatric hospitalist on site 24/7.
Kaweah Health adding more RNs
Working with area educational institutions Kaweah Health has a robust pipeline of new RNs that should be working with the hospital in coming years.The pipeline of new nurses expects some 73 new nurses will be added in 2026, 25 in 2027 and 50 in the year 2028.Local RN graduates should than double by 2026.
chart from Kaweah Health
baby pic: Braelynn Tate Nicholson, Kaweah Health’s first baby girl of 2023.