Cincinnati Children’s Fetal Care Center Special Delivery Unit Launches Expansion

Collaboration with TriHealth allows for better support for pregnant women and their babies

Wednesday, July 08, 2020

Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center and TriHealth are announcing the expansion of the special delivery unit at the Cincinnati Children’s Fetal Care Center. Located at Cincinnati Children’s, the collaboration will provide comprehensive care for healthy moms expecting a baby with known medical conditions that require specialized care at the hospital’s level IV neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) and cardiac intensive care unit (CICU).

“Our Fetal Care Center is one of only a few comprehensive fetal care centers in the country. Moms, who are having babies with the most complex fetal conditions, will be able to deliver at Cincinnati Children’s and recover on-site while their baby receives immediate care from our pediatrics specialists.” said Daniel von Allmen, MD, surgeon-in-chief at Cincinnati Children's. “We believe this will have a huge impact on their outcomes because they will be able to stay together.”

Many of these fragile babies, whose lives are in the balance, are born at other hospitals in the region and urgently transported to the Cincinnati Children’s NICU and CICU. By collaborating with TriHealth, these babies will avoid emergency transport, as they will be born just down the hall from the NICU.

“This collaboration provides the opportunity for healthy moms with medically fragile babies to have a one stop shop for all of their care from the very start of their pregnancy through delivery and baby care,” said Mounira Habli, MD, Director, TriHealth Fetal Center. “This integrated model of care will bring better outcomes for mom and baby in our community and around the country.”

In addition to two new operating rooms to increase access to fetal surgery procedures and c-section deliveries, the expansion will include a triage room and six dedicated rooms for labor, delivery and postpartum recovery. Special delivery services will be available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. This means that moms will no longer stay behind at a birthing hospital, separated from their newborns. Families will be together in one location.

Through this collaboration, Cincinnati Children’s will provide expertise in fetal therapy, NICU care and pediatric sub-specialty services. TriHealth, with the largest group of maternal-fetal-medicine specialists in the market, will provide expertise in obstetrics/maternal-fetal medicine.

“We believe this collaboration will provide world-class care for a very special population,” said von Allmen.

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