ISMA Past President Lisa Hatcher, MD, testified about Indiana’s maternal mortality rate on Tuesday, Oct. 4, before the Indiana General Assembly’s Interim Committee on Public Health, Behavioral Health and Human Services. Just over half of Indiana’s pregnancy-associated deaths were among women who didn’t receive prenatal care until at least the second trimester or at all, according to the Indiana Department of Health. 

Dr. Hatcher told the committee that many women avoid prenatal care for fear it will expose their substance-abuse issues. Drug overdoses are Indiana’s most frequent cause of pregnancy-associated deaths, accounting for nearly a third of the total.