Separated at Birth: Rethinking the Urine Drug Screen in Pregnancy

Sunday, April 7, 2024

10:15 AM – 11:30 AM

Presenter(s)

Elizabeth Kravitz, MD

Resident Physician
Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania

Slides
NB

Nia M. Bhadra-Heintz, MD, MS

Assistant Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Addiction Medicine Faculty
Hospital University Of Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania

Non-presenting author(s)

CM

Cara McClellan, JD

Director and Associate Practice Professor
Penn Carey Law, Pennsylvania

Urine drug screening on the labor floor perpetuates racial disparities that extends past medical outcomes and into the autonomy of birthing persons. Join the conversation in this panel discussion with Dr. Nia Bhadra Heintz, Assistant Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology and Co-Director of the Perinatal Resources for Opioid Use Disorder Program, and Dr. Elizabeth Kravitz, project lead of an interdisciplinary coalition of University of Pennsylvania’s Health Equity group and Penn Carey Law School’s Advocacy for Racial and Civil Justice Clinic.

Learning Objectives:

Learners will be able to:

Develop an appreciation for the racial and socio-economic complexity behind laws governing drug use during pregnancy and be able to contextualize these laws with the use of Urine Drug Screen during pregnancy
Recognize and be able to identify the biases that exist in the Department of Human Services/Child Protective Services system, which, like all institutions, are subject to injustices in their creation and structure
Identify the contexts in which they would or would not be appropriate in a multidisciplinary discussion with neonatologists, social workers, and nurses at their intuitions