First lady Melania Trump visits WV facility for drug-affected babies

HUNTINGTON, W.Va. — First lady Melania Trump reached out to some of the tiniest victims of the substance abuse epidemic during a visit to Lily’s Place in Huntington Tuesday.

Trump on Tuesday afternoon visited with staff and the newborn patients at the facility, which is the first long-term recovery center in the country for mothers and their babies exposed to drugs in the womb and born suffering from addiction.

In her second independent public trip as first lady, Trump landed at Tri-State Airport just after 11 a.m. Tuesday en route to visit Lily’s Place and its executive director, Rebecca Crowder, who participated in a September roundtable discussion about opioid abuse hosted by Trump in Washington, D.C.

Trump departed Tri-State Airport about two hours after she arrived, after having toured Lily’s Place and talking with staff there.

Media access to Trump’s visit was limited to the first 10 minutes of a roundtable discussion among Trump, Crowder, special advisor to the president Kellyanne Conway, Lily’s Place nursing director and co-founder Rhonda Edmunds, Lily’s Place co-founder and board president Sara Murray, and Lily’s Place social worker Angela Davis.

Rachel Kinder, whose son received treatment at the facility, also participated in the discussion, with her son resting on her lap.

Lily’s Place was founded in 2014 by a group of volunteers and health care workers, many of whom met through the neonatal intensive care unit at Cabell Huntington Hospital and saw how babies born addicted to drugs were suffering, Edmunds said.

Currently, the facility is licensed to house and treat 12 babies at a time, although there is room in the facility for up to 16 babies, Crowder said.

The facility is housed in a former doctor’s office that was donated to the group that founded Lily’s Place. What used to be exam rooms have been remodeled to be nurseries, each one with its own theme and sponsored by local donors.

Staff at the facility care for and treat babies suffering from neonatal abstinence syndrome, commonly referred to as NAS. The diagnosis is for babies who have been exposed to addictive substances, whether illegal or prescription, in the womb.

About 140 out of every 1,000 babies born at Cabell Huntington are born with NAS, according to a West Virginia Public Broadcasting report. The national average is six out of every 1,000 births.

Babies afflicted by NAS suffer all the symptoms of withdrawal. Health care providers at the facility treat and tend to the babies’ needs, but careful balance is given between staff comforting the babies and letting them self-soothe while they work through withdrawal.

Crowder told The Herald-Dispatch last year it costs $600 per baby per day for treatment.

On Tuesday, Crowder said it is difficult to get coverage from Medicaid and other insurers due to the novelty of the services provided by the facility, noting the facility has difficulty billing for services because not all of their treatments are recognized by Medicaid.

“As a facility that is the first of our kind, we face a lot of challenges,” Crowder said.

She also said the facility can’t accept babies from Kentucky and Ohio who are born in Huntington, even though about half of the babies born at Cabell Huntington are from those two states.

Staff at the facility also work to help mothers seek substance abuse treatment, and as the facility’s social worker, Davis helps parents navigate the legal and social ramifications of their circumstances without blame or judgment, she said.

When Trump asked if the stigma of using drugs while pregnant is enough to stop mothers from seeking help, Davis said it was one of the biggest barriers for mothers, many of whom have little to no other family support.

“I think that is one of the biggest barriers is mothers have a lot of shame and a lot of guilt,” Davis said. “They see their babies suffering. We try to tell them, ‘Don’t be ruled by your past. What are you going to do in your future?’ ”

During the last night of their babies’ stay at Lily’s Place, the moms who still have custody of their babies spend the night in a special nursery at the facility and receive assistance in how to care for their child.

Care continues after babies “graduate” from Lily’s Place through regular check-ups with a physician to make sure they are meeting their milestones, and mothers are welcome to return for help whenever they need it.

“It’s done a lot for me,” Kinder said. “I love to bring him and see everybody. I talk to Angela all the time. Anytime I need anything, I can call her, even if it’s just to talk.”

There were 880 overdoses reported in West Virginia in 2016, but the exact demographics of who is overdosing where is limited to the data-gathering done by individual emergency responders.

During the 2017 regular legislative session, West Virginia lawmakers passed a law creating a state Office of Drug Control Policy that will establish better means of data collection about drug overdoses and who suffers them with the goal of better coordinating funding and treatment throughout the state.

In August, President Donald Trump verbally declared the opioid epidemic a national emergency, but no official steps have been completed to make a federal declaration.

If the president makes the declaration, he could allocate federal funds toward substance abuse treatment and prevention programs, as well as provide waivers to rules that otherwise limit access to substance abuse treatment and other resources.

The declaration could help unlock more support and resources to address the drug overdose epidemic, such as additional funding and expanded access to various forms of treatment, and it gives the government more flexibility in waiving rules and restrictions to expedite action.