Early prenatal care is important, and can be difficult to get in Southwest Florida. Planned Parenthood of Southwest and Central Florida now offers prenatal services for patients in their first 12 weeks of pregnancy.
They offer a large slate of tests and care, according to Chief Medical Officer Robyn Schickler.
“Ultrasound to confirm the pregnancy and how far along someone is, a panel of prenatal lab tests that is the regular that you would get with an OB GYN. It can include genetic testing and then any sort of early pregnancy symptom management to help the patient get through that first trimester,” said Dr. Schickler.
As soon as a patient comes in, staff begins to locate an OBGyn who can follow up for the rest of the pregnancy, Schickler said.
The need is great, she said. That’s because doctors are leaving the area and the number of patients has increased.
“There are some OBGyns, statistically, leaving, particularly states with abortion bans, us included. So OBGyns leaving, and then we got a huge population boom in Florida too. So the demand went up, supply went down, to simplify it,” Dr. Schickler said.
Some patients in the area have reported that it has taken three to four months to get an OBGyn appointment. That means they are not getting care until the second trimester, at the earliest.
“If they're not getting it early, they might be getting it later, but by then, all of the organs have developed in the pregnancy. A lot of things have happened already,” she said.
That can certainly lead to poor prenatal care. And Florida is not doing well on that score. A 2024 March of Dimes report ranks Florida 50th out of 52 states and territories, including Washington D.C. and Puerto Rico, for adequate prenatal care.
“If you're not getting any prenatal care, you're not at the healthiest that you could be, and the pregnancy is not going to be at the healthiest that it could be, which is going to lead to these poor maternal and infant outcomes,” said Dr. Schickler.
First trimester care is available at Planned Parenthood health centers in Fort Myers, Naples, Sarasota, Tampa, St Petersburg, Lakeland and Kissimee. Initial ultrasound must be completed in Fort Myers, Kissimee, or Sarasota.
For more information, go to ppswcf.org.
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