Kettering clinic for tiniest opioid victims sends first patient home

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While weaning infants from opioids is medically important, the support for their mothers and the family education provided by Brigid’s Path for up to a year will do much to improve outcomes for the fragile newborns and society, said Kim Kleinhans, the family advocacy director of the non-profit clinic in Kettering.

“Ultimately the goal is to strengthen the families,” she said. “If we get the families stable, then baby will have a safe place to be. If we have a healthy baby with a healthy family, then we’ll be successful and strengthen the community as well.”

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The first patient, a boy, spent about 10 days at the crisis care nursery after about a month in a neonatal intensive care unit at a local hospital. However, most newborns exposed to opioids require just three to five days in a hospital, Kleinhans said.

“As long as the baby is medically stable, and doesn’t have any other medical issues and just needs support through the withdrawal, then they can transfer here,” she said.

A second newborn arrived Tuesday at the $2 million facility with 24 private nurseries at 3601 South Dixie Drive.

Babies born with drugs in their systems suffer from an array of difficulties which can lead to lengthy, expensive hospital stays. Symptoms can include low birth weight, breathing problems, irritability, diarrhea, vomiting, feeding and sleeping problems and sometimes seizures.

An average of six babies a day — or 2,174 total — were admitted to Ohio hospitals in 2015 for neonatal abstinence syndrome, a consequence of the opioid crisis. In 2006, just slightly more than 300 cases were reported statewide.

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According to the Ohio Department of Health, more than $133 million in Medicaid charges was spent treating drug-exposed newborns who stayed an average 14 days in Ohio’s hospitals during 2015. Between 2006 and 2015, the average charge associated with NAS hospitalizations increased from $39,561 to $61,371.

“We’re going to do that at a significantly less cost to the community,” Kleinhans said. “Now, obviously privately funded, there’s no cost to anybody.”

Brigid’s Path is not currently reimbursed by Medicaid, but a proposed federal law, the CRIB Act, could amend the Social Security Act to allow a state program to pay for services at a residential pediatric recovery center for infants with neonatal abstinence syndrome.

The bill was sponsored by U.S. Rep. Evan Jenkins, R-W.V., who represents Huntington, the location of Lily’s Place, the first such standalone clinic in the country.

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Jill Kingston, executive director and co-founder of Brigid’s Path, said the organization is also working to show state legislators how the facility might trim health care costs for Ohio if the federal bill stalls.

“At the state level, they are waiting for us to prove this and decide whether they will move forward with a waiver at the state level for Medicaid,” she said. “Until then, it’s total private donations.”

Kingston was a foster mother caring for two drug-exposed babies in the spring of 2014 when she started working toward the clinic. Lily’s Place provided a model for Kingston and co-founder Deanna Murphy, who is no longer with Brigid’s Path.

Medication is given to many infants in progressively lower doses to help wean them from drugs, but a large part of the treatment they receive at Brigid’s Path is non-pharmacological.

“We feed them when they want to eat. We have the capacity to hold and comfort them continuously,” Cypher said. “The can’t handle a lot of neurological inputs so we dim the lights and keep things quiet and keep movement to a minimum.”

The first infant discharged from Brigid’s Path went home with a Dayton-area couple who are relative caregivers with temporary custody of the boy.

“Everyone in this facility has been amazing. I think everyone played a big part in his progress,” said a relative who’s caring for the infant and asked not to be identified. “This place is so homey feeling, it’s not overstimulating like it is in the hospital. It’s quiet, which babies like. Around-the-clock care, the coddling, the nurturing, he wouldn’t get at a hospital.”