Callie and Dustin Kellums had twins in 2020, a boy named Luke and a girl named Kate. Born prematurely, both newborns required care in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) at St. Bernards Medical Center in Jonesboro. After a week, Luke was diagnosed with bacterial meningitis, and it quickly became apparent that he needed more advanced care.

Luke was med-flighted to Arkansas Children’s in Little Rock, splitting the babies up between two hospitals, two hours apart.

“It wasn’t easy having one baby in Jonesboro and one baby in Little Rock,” said Dustin. “We were so lucky to have Callie’s parents near and a great group of friends to help us. Plus, this was during COVID so only one person at a time could visit the babies. That obviously made things more difficult.”

The couple also had a 2-year-old son, Ben, at home, which added to the complexities of caring for their family. “I received some good advice from a doctor at St. Bernards,” said Callie. “She told me that our newborns had excellent around-the-clock care in both hospitals. And it was okay to focus on Ben so things could be as normal as possible for him. I appreciated that advice.”

Fifteen days after the twins were born, Luke succumbed to bacterial meningitis and passed away.

“When Luke died, we wanted to do something positive with our grief,” said Callie. “We received such amazing care at St. Bernards in Jonesboro for both of our babies, we decided to help expand their NICU so that families in this area didn’t have to go hours away for better care. We raised nearly $100,000, and recently pledged another $70,000 to the NICU.”

A friend of the Kellums, Wade Bowen, suggested that Dustin and Callie use Arkansas Community Foundation to help manage the donations. The couple started the Luke Kellums NICU Fund – Benefiting St. Bernards.

“We saw a level of care in Little Rock that northeast Arkansas just didn’t have,” said Dustin. “We wanted to see that same level of staffing and equipment become available to families here. The latest expansion at St. Bernards is named after Luke. This keeps his memory alive and gives our children something to be proud of.”

“Our hope for the future is that if anyone else is faced with having a baby in the NICU,” Callie continued, “that they can be as close to their babies as possible, for as long as possible.”

Ujima Maternity Network trains birth professionals to address maternal health disparities

By Adena White

Maternal deaths from pregnancy-related causes continue to rise. From 2018 to 2021, for every 100,000 live births in Arkansas, 44 mothers died from pregnancy-related complications before their baby’s first birthday.

Socioeconomic and racial disparities exacerbate this crisis: Black, non-Hispanic mothers are twice as likely to die from pregnancy-related causes than white, non-Hispanic mothers.

One proven solution to the maternal health crisis is ensuring that all women have access to doula support. Doulas provide physical and emotional support to pregnant women during pregnancy and beyond and are different from midwives in that they give no medical care. Visionary doulas across Arkansas have come together to form a doula association, with technical assistance provided by Excel by Eight. The doulas’ vision is to advance the profession of birth work through advocacy and education, improve access to doula services, and ensure the consistency and quality of those services. In particular, doulas are advocating to have their services reimbursed by Medicaid and health insurance plans.

Nicolle Fletcher is one of the doulas leading this effort. When she completed her doula certification training in 2010, little was known about the nation’s growing rate of maternal deaths. She became a doula to help women “reclaim the power of birth,” providing guidance and support to women during labor as well as serving as a lactation counselor, childbirth educator, and an apprentice midwife.

“When it comes to the maternal health crisis,” Fletcher said. “Doula care should be accessible to the people who need it most, regardless of their socioeconomic status.”

Fletcher first noticed in 2017 that poor health outcomes for Black mothers began to grab national headlines. Around this same time, she was at a point in her career where she felt discouraged and considered quitting the profession altogether. But an increase in clientele — particularly among Black women who were concerned about the alarming statistics in the news — reminded her of her purpose.

“I’m here on purpose, and I think about so many lives that have been impacted by me following my purpose, which has opened doors for others to do the same.”

As one of the few Black doulas in Arkansas at the time, Fletcher recognized a need to train more Black women to become doulas to address these growing concerns. What was initially designed to be a one-time, weeklong training for aspiring doulas became the creation of a new nonprofit, Ujima Maternity Network.

Fletcher — along with doulas Sarita Hendrix, Amber White, Regina Chaten, Shenika Reed, Erika Davis, and Shakia Jackson — founded the nonprofit on December 28, 2018, the third day of the seven-day African American holiday of Kwanzaa. The principle of Ujima (pronounced oo-JEE-mah) is the focus that third day, which means “collective work and responsibility” in the Swahili language.

“Ujima is about collective work. We’re going to work collectively; we’re going to own our responsibility, and we’re going to bring about solutions,” Fletcher said.

Since it was established, Ujima Maternity Network has trained 25 doulas of diverse ethnic backgrounds in hopes of reaching more women across the entire state. Six women are currently enrolled in the training program, and the goal is to train 40 doulas across the state this year.

“It’s fundamental to have an advocate as far as doula support that looks like you and can meet you right where you are without having to explain certain things,” Fletcher said. “There is an uncommunicated understanding that exists.”

During the six-month certification program, doulas-in-training are required to read and report on at least five assigned books, attend at least three birth experiences, participate in monthly training sessions with other members of their cohort, and complete a research paper. The participants are paired with a mentor doula and attend outreach events, emphasizing the importance of communal care.

Since Ujima’s founding, Fletcher has witnessed a decrease in cesarean sections and an increase in birth satisfaction, resulting in mothers who feel educated, supported, and empowered during their birth experiences.

“People do a lot of missions overseas, but Arkansas is a mission field,” Fletcher said. “And I think we need to look at it that way.”

By Jessica Ford

Arkansas continues to face troubling challenges as it battles a persistently high infant mortality rate, with recent data painting a grim picture of the state’s struggle to safeguard its babies.

The Arkansas Department of Health defines infant mortality as a statistic that looks at the number of babies who die each year before they reach their first birthday. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) based on data from 2022, for every 1000 live births in Arkansas, there were 7.67 infant deaths — above the national average of 5.7 deaths per 1,000. This places Arkansas with the third-highest infant mortality rate in the nation.

Similar reports reveal a disproportionate burden of infant mortality among Black communities. According to the Arkansas Center for Health Improvement (ACHI,) deaths among Black infants remain the highest of all racial and ethnic groups, with 10.86 deaths per 1,000 births in 2022, compared to 4.52 deaths per 1,000 births among white infants.

Some efforts to combat infant mortality are underway. The University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS) created the Following Baby Back Home program for families of infants after their discharge from a Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU). The program sends healthcare providers to homes, especially in rural areas, to help provide support for new moms.

Newborns in the program often have specific needs at home to thrive, like preemie-sized equipment or other essentials. Some mothers have confided to the program’s nurses that they borrowed car seats, or they have to co-sleep because they don’t have a bassinet.

“Many women are reluctant to have home visits because they worry that the nurses will critique their parenting,” said Heidi Klappenbach, a visiting nurse in Union County. “But I love telling them that they’re doing a good job.”

Klappenbach brings a portable scale to check baby’s weight and talks with moms about signs of postpartum depression, growth and development, immunizations and even checking for smoke and carbon monoxide detectors in homes.

“We want to help,” she said. “I try to connect them to whatever resources they need.”

New nonprofit seeks to amplify the voices of families across Arkansas By Adena White

In early May of 2022, Ashley Bearden Campbell’s pregnancy took a sharp turn. She was admitted to the hospital in anticipation that she would remain on bed rest until her baby’s July 1 due date. Health complications necessitated an emergency cesarean section, and her daughter, Aubrey, entered the world at 28 weeks and five days, weighing a mere 2 pounds, 4 ounces.

“I had a wonderful pregnancy up until I didn’t,” Bearden Campbell said.

During Aubrey’s 70-day stay in the neonatal intensive care unit, Bearden Campbell remained by her daughter’s side as much as possible. Her concern for the baby was all-consuming, causing the new mom to unconsciously neglect her own mental health. An attentive neonatal intensive care unit nurse recognized the signs of postpartum depression and anxiety in the new mom and urged her to seek help. That pivotal conversation led her to therapy, medication, and a newfound determination to ensure other mothers wouldn’t endure similar struggles alone.

“Had the nurse not pulled me aside, I don’t know where I would be today,” she said.

From that moment, the seeds of Arkansans for Improving Maternal Health (AIM) were sown. Founded in January 2024 and led by Bearden Campbell, AIM is a nonprofit organization with a mission to “raise public awareness, cultivate champions for change, and spur action around the issue of maternal health in Arkansas.” In 2018, 92% of maternal deaths were found to be preventable. Additionally, 48% of Arkansas counties are without an obstetric provider, and nearly half of the 75 counties do not have a birthing facility.

“Through AIM, we created a platform to raise awareness around maternal health and create a space for families who have been impacted by challenges in maternal health,” Bearden Campbell said. “We want to address gaps in the access, affordability, and quality of care for women and infants before, during, and after pregnancy.”

AIM’s immediate priority has been to create a safe space for moms and families to share their stories. Bearden Campbell said these stories — whether shared publicly through AIM’s website or in conversations among family and friends — are necessary to catalyze change. The most effective advocates for improving maternal health are Arkansans who have experienced challenges as a result of poor maternal health care.

“I’ve always believed that stories are powerful, and I’ve seen for myself that sharing my own experience has led to a domino effect of others sharing their experiences,” she said. “Together, our voices will serve as a call to action for policymakers to make maternal and infant health a priority.”

In March, Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders signed an executive order to create the Arkansas Strategic Committee for Maternal Health. AIM for Arkansas will work alongside other members of this steering committee to improve health outcomes for mothers and babies across the state.

“We’re excited to be included in this mix of organizations that are helping raise awareness about this public health crisis,” Bearden Campbell said. “The governor’s executive order was a huge win for our state, and the positive response we’ve seen from families and other stakeholders shows us how critical this mission is to the future of Arkansas.”

Families who desire to share a video recording or written testimonial about their experiences with the maternal health crisis are invited to upload a story at aimforarkansas.org.

By Olivia Walton

What a difference a year can make.

Last spring, Arkansas reached an inflection point. We decided that our last-place finish in maternal outcomes was no longer acceptable. We decided that our mothers, our children and our families deserve more.

Through education and advocacy, there is now a swell of support for improving maternal healthcare, and universal agreement that taking care of moms matters.

A year ago, our sights were set on a 12-month Medicaid expansion for moms. Now in 2024, we have a signed executive order from Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders that works smarter, not harder, to get women the care they need before, during and after birth.

I’m optimistic that the governor has lent her support to this critical issue, and I look forward to seeing this order in action — it’s pro-family. It helps ensure our kids can thrive in school, and it’s fiscally responsible.

Rather than creating redundancies in coverage, the plan will automatically enroll more eligible women in Medicaid, eliminate gaps and streamline access statewide. A groundbreaking pilot program will also target the five most at-risk counties to increase prenatal care.

Most importantly, the governor has requested that private stakeholders work alongside the state’s Department of Health, Department of Human Services, and surgeon general to develop a strategic plan for maternal health moving forward.

Over the coming months, this is where I see my organization, Ingeborg Initiatives, being most helpful.

At Ingeborg, we are on a mission to empower Arkansas moms by improving maternal health, advancing women’s economic opportunity and expanding access to quality care and early learning opportunities for children.

Our team, led by Harvard-trained perinatal epidemiologist and University of Arkansas professor Dr. Cara Osborne, will work with the recently established Arkansas Strategic Committee for Maternal Health on solutions.

Among our top priorities are those laid out in a new report by Heartland Forward. They include: advocating for more community health workers; expanding access to telehealth; addressing healthcare workforce shortages, including midwives; and increasing reimbursement rates and transparency on costs and data.

In other rural states across the country, these tried-and-true solutions are already in place and working.

In Arkansas, preventing just half of maternal deaths would save the state $872 million a year. This savings could underwrite 11,000 nursing scholarships or fund two new 500-bed hospitals.

As an adopted Arkansan, I’m proud to lend my voice and leadership to Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, the Momentary and Heartland Summit.

But as a mom of three children, I became invested in the state when I founded Ingeborg Initiatives because it was personal for me. Even in the best of circumstances, motherhood is hard. For those without access to care and resources, it can feel impossible.

A year ago, most people either believed that maternal care in the state was adequate, or they didn’t think much about it at all.

Today, they understand that empowering mothers isn’t just a women’s issue. Ensuring that mom is healthy and economically secure is the most efficient, impactful intervention we can make for the strength of our families — and communities — as a whole.

By Kim Dishongh

When a woman is pregnant, there is often no information she values more than the kind that comes from her mother, grandmother, sister and aunts. Those female mentors are not always readily available, however, so the Arkansas Birthing Project works to fill in the gaps.

“We work to establish fictive kinship relationships,” said Zenobia Harris, executive director of the Arkansas Birthing Project. “Our founder calls it ‘sister-friending.’ Some people already have good family support, and they just want extra support, and some people don’t have much support at all.” Sister-friends, women who volunteer to serve as mentors to pregnant women, step in and serve as social support to help improve the chances that moms and their babies will be healthy.

“By being a part of this ‘family,’ you have a lot of people who are looking out for you and who are willing to make sure that you’re going to be okay during this process and afterwards,” Harris said.

Arkansas Birthing Project was founded in 1988 by Katherine Hall-Trujillo. Trujillo, born in Moscow, near Pine Bluff, was a public health administrator for the state of California at the time, and she had ample experience working with women who lacked access to good healthcare during their pregnancies. The group made themselves available for informal conversations about pregnancy and motherhood, and they offered support, too, like rides to prenatal visits.

“She and nine of her friends bound together in what we call a ‘bunch,’ and they agreed to provide social support to a group of young women who were considered to be high risk,” Harris said of Trujillo. “What they found astounded them. The women gave birth to babies that were at term; they were at good birth weights, there were no ICU stays required of the babies when they were born; moms did better after birth with this extra support…”

The program was recreated within that California community and, eventually, beyond.

“The Birthing Project has been replicated in more than 70 communities across the United States and also in seven foreign countries, including Cuba,” said Harris. “In 1999, the Birthing Project came to Arkansas.”

Arkansas Birthing Project aims for little sisters — the pregnant women who participate in the organization’s program — to give birth to full-term babies, with birthweights of 5 pounds or more.

Sister-friends are volunteers from all walks of life, Harris said.

“We work with sororities, women’s church groups, community clubs — anywhere women gather and work in fellowship — to recruit our sister-friends,” Harris said. “They commit to one year. We make sure that our little sisters have a prenatal care provider, that they attend their appointments, and that they make provisions for themselves and their babies during this time to make sure they have a healthy outcome.”

Arkansas Birthing Project also provides assistance, on occasion, with car seats and cribs and other equipment necessary for the first year of a baby’s life. The organization can pass on donated baby clothing and can provide diapers and sometimes baby formula or breast pumps, as well.

“We certainly work on social supports, things that people need to have a healthy situation, like a place to live, food to eat, a safe sleep environment,” Harris said. “We also include encouraging young women to do some planning for their future. We call it dreaming, and many of the young women we work with don’t have dreams for their futures. Many of our young women are focused on subsistence living — surviving.”

The little sisters are asked to consider where they see themselves and their babies in a year — or in five years — and then encouraged to work on planning how to reach those goals.

Arkansas Birthing Project is funded through grants from organizations like Arkansas Community Foundation and from private donations.

“We have had some pretty lean years, and I’ve often done things out of my pocket because I believe in this,” said Harris. “I think it’s another important component, of all the things that are out there to help women. I think there are different things for different people, and the people that we tend to interact with and attract are people that I call ‘off the grid’ people- people that other people perhaps don’t value as much or feel like they can be as successful. We believe they can.”

In the fertile soil of the Arkansas Delta, you’ll find a special group of leaders, volunteers and donors committed to making Craighead County the best it can be.

Craighead County Community Foundation was founded in 2001. Since its inception, the group has made $3.1 million in grants and scholarships. Their Giving Tree program continues to grow and accepts applications once a year. Recently, the affiliate received a large estate gift that will allow them to make nearly double the amount of Giving Tree grants in future years.

“There is a lot of need here. In response to that need, we are listening to the nonprofits closely and working hard to meet them where they are and be more flexible in how we provide funding,” said Jonathan Jacobs, current chair of the local board.

“I like our approach to grantmaking,” he said. “Our goal is to maximize our grant dollars to make the most impact possible. Knowing the nonprofits better enables us to do this.”

Jacobs and his wife started a fund at the Community Foundation in 2021 and give to a variety of causes. “I love having my whole family involved in philanthropy. We named our endowment together and I want my children to see the needs here locally and understand how people experience life different from us,” he said. “My dad taught me about service to others. One of my earliest memories was watching him fry fish [at an annual fundraiser] at Camp Aldersgate in Little Rock. I’m grateful he taught me how to give back. One way I do that is by serving on this board.”

“Old ideas of philanthropy are gone,” said Gina Gomez, former board member. “The needs are too great so we must adapt and change. Literacy rates are dismal. Poverty is increasing. We must rise up to address these needs and more. By recruiting young professionals to our board, encouraging youth to be involved and pursuing as much information as we can, this community foundation is bringing new life to this county and its residents.”

Melissa Ayers is the executive director for the affiliate. “Next year, we plan to grant more than $108,000 from our Giving Tree and Stop Hunger endowments and want to keep doing more. We prioritize different areas of focus for our grantmaking based on data and community needs,” said Ayers. “But in addition to grantmaking, we are trying to teach this community about what philanthropy really is. It’s more than monetary donations and more than something only wealthy people can do — it is anything you can do that will help others.”

“This affiliate has always had strong leadership, and we’ve always been a little ahead of the curve,” said Gomez. “But we want to keep building on that by being a better listener for underserved communities, attracting new donors and reaching out to new nonprofits. We want people in this area to know that this Foundation is for everyone.”

Craighead County Community Foundation is one of 29 local offices. To learn more about our affiliate system, visit arcf.org/affilates.