Compassionate, transformative care for substance-using pregnant people and their babies
As part of our commitment that every parent and baby get off to the healthiest start possible, Providence Swedish’s Ballard campus is home to the Substance-Using Pregnant People Program. The program serves to improve long-term health for birthing parents and their babies by providing whole person, compassionate care.
The Providence Swedish SUPP program cares for an average of 350 mothers annually and is unique in that it is open to patients at any stage of their pregnancy through the postpartum period, and for those with high medical needs.
In 2024, the SUPP program served patients from 21 Washington state counties, with the majority from King, Snohomish and Pierce counties. More than three-quarters of the unit's patients come from low-income backgrounds and often struggle with inadequate insurance coverage.
The SUPP program’s multidisciplinary team delivers inpatient medical withdrawal management and stabilization, psychosocial treatment, obstetric evaluation and care, 24-hour nursing care, and parenting and childbirth education.
The SUPP program leads to positive health outcomes for both the birthing parent and child, including:
- Decreased substance use, overdose and relapse rates
- Improved withdrawal management
- Tobacco cessation
- Improved breastfeeding
- Decreased entry rate into the foster care system
- Decreased emergency department utilization rates
- Decreased postpartum hospitalization readmissions
The program’s COMPASSION model (Community of Maternal Parenting Support for Substance Impacted People and Newborns) provides a five-day postpartum floor stay for new moms. This approach fosters “zero separation” and a whole-person approach through respect, compassion, self-sufficiency and empowerment while the baby receives Eat, Sleep, and Console services. While this model focuses on the infant, the Compassion model provides services to the parent. This allows the parent to continue to receive medical stabilization and continued case management services necessary to promote health for the parent and baby.
