POTSDAM – St. Lawrence Health System is offering healthcare from certified nurse midwives.

Barbara Drake Hillis, CNM, is located in the Women’s Health Clinic, Casey Medical Office Building, 15 Hospital Drive, Massena; and Megan Gagner, CNM, and Laurie Mousaw, CNM, are located in the Helen Snell Cheel Medical Campus, 49 Lawrence Ave.

Certified Nurse Midwife Hillis explained that in New York midwives are licensed through the State. They specialize in providing holistic care for women during healthy pregnancies, childbirth, and postpartum, as well as primary preventive reproductive health care.

“Any woman can request a midwife, and many midwives believe every woman should have a midwife. We provide care for women from their first menstruation until after menopause,” she said.

Megan Gagner, CNM, pointed out that, “As a midwife, and mother, I can share my experience and education with other women: to help them find confidence and to empower them in their bodies and minds; to help them feel reassured and safe; and to encourage them to do the best they can.”

Laurie Mousaw, CNM, said, “I chose to enter OB when I was working as a registered nurse. I loved working with labor patients, but I was disappointed when I had to leave them at the end of my shift. I decided to go back to school to become a Certified Nurse Midwife and be able to actually help deliver the babies.”

Midwives provide a multitude of services in an outpatient/office setting, such as:

Annual exams, including gynecological care, primary care, health screenings, and counseling with a focus on health promotion and disease prevention

First exams for young women

Family planning and prescribing of birth control methods, including IUDs and Nexplanon

Writing prescriptions

Testing and treatment of infections, from yeast infections to sexually transmitted infections

Assessment and treatment of irregular menstrual bleeding

Perimenopausal and postmenopausal counseling and care

Orders for mammograms and other imaging

Preconception counseling

Maternity care - prenatal, postpartum, and newborn care, including ultrasounds, and labs

Consultation or collaboration with other providers, or referral to other providers as needed; such as obstetricians, gynecologists, neurologists, cardiologists, etc.

Inpatient services, or hospitalized care, offered by midwives include:

Admission of women for labor or inductions, attendance at vaginal births, postpartum, and discharge home

Admission and care of women with hyperemesis gravidarum or kidney infections

“If a midwife has received specialty training, she can further provide circumcisions, and be the first assist during surgical procedures, such as cesarean sections,” Ms. Hillis said.

She has a page on SLHS’s website at https://www.stlawrencehealthsystem.org/providers/barbara-drake-hillis; Megan Gagner, CNM, has a page at https://www.stlawrencehealthsystem.org/providers/megan-gagner; and Laurie Mousaw, CNM, has a page athttps://www.stlawrencehealthsystem.org/providers/laurie-mousaw.

Their Women’s Health and OB/GYN page is at https://www.stlawrencehealthsystem.org/services/womens-health-and-obgyn.