Valley Presbyterian Hospital welcomed a new addition last week, opening seven luxury birthing suites in its maternity ward. The suites will allow mothers to go through labor, delivery and recovery in one room.
Hospital officials said the expansion of the obstetrics department meets a standard of care that patients began to demand in the last decade. The Van Nuys facility has the busiest obstetrics unit in the San Fernando Valley, with more than 4,000 births last year.
Mothers used to be moved from room to room for labor, delivery and recovery. For some hospitals that is still the case, but maternity wards need to offer all three services in one room if they want to gain customers.
“We are bringing the latest standards to the community here,” said Gayathri Jith, vice president of operations at Valley Presbyterian. These standards are known as LDR, for labor, delivery and recovery.
Jim Lott, executive vice president of the Hospital Association of Southern California, said that a hospital can’t open an obstetrics unit without offering patients LDR rooms and expect to be competitive in the market. To open a unit without LDR services would be like making a floppy disc to use on a computer today.
“That’s so 1970,” Lott said. “You just don’t do that.”
Hospital staff workers gave $1,000 toward the education of the first baby born in the unit. That was the daughter of Anita Rodriguez and Pablo Zamora. They named her Nevaeh, or Heaven spelled backwards.
Competitor services
Valley Presbyterian’s main competitor, Providence Holy Cross Medical Center of Mission Hills, has similar services to Valley Presbyterian but no luxury suites. Both institutions provide LDR and neonatal intensive care services, and each offers breastfeeding education.
Providence Holy Cross opened a women’s pavilion with operating rooms for cesarean sections and 138 beds in July of last year, but did not add luxury suites.
“Our focus has been on keeping things affordable for people,” said Patricia Aidem, spokeswoman for the hospital.
At Providence Holy Cross, a mother is moved after recovery to a postpartum room, where she stays until leaving the hospital. At Valley Presbyterian, a mother will check into one of the suites and stay there until taking her infant home.
Providence Holy Cross and Valley Presbyterian each serve the largely Hispanic population in the East Valley. Both hospitals have several bilingual members on staff and provide written materials in English and Spanish.
Worthwhile investment
Adding LDR services is a worthwhile investment for hospitals, Lott said. Ninety percent of hospitals in Los Angeles County that provide obstetric services are LDR equipped.
More than 62 percent of hospital costs are labor related, Lott said. LDR keeps labor contained in one room and thus makes it cheaper. It also fends off potential legal issues and costs. If complications occur during the birthing process, it can be risky to take time to transfer a mother to a separate room.
Valley Presbyterian’s expansion cost $4.5 million. Bank of America Foundation gave about $500,000 of the amount; Ralph M. Parsons Foundation gave about $200,000. Most of the rest came from the hospital’s operational revenue and some came from a loan.
The money was used for room renovations, warmers for infants, maternal and fetal monitors, and an electronic medical record system. Jith hopes that patients who give birth at the maternity ward will come back to the hospital for other services.
Making a good impression on new moms could pay off down the road. Lott said that women make 85 percent of the decisions for nonemergency health care needs for their family members. Pregnant women have nine months to “shop” for a maternity ward. If a hospital wants a piece of that market, it needs to offer LDR services in order to attract customers. Valley Presbyterian is aiming to do just that.
“That’s a smart thing that they are doing because that will make them competitors,” Lott said.
