Women often travel hours to get maternity care. One couple is trying to change that

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    SHATTUCK, Oklahoma (KOCO) — Traveling hours to receive maternity care is a reality that many pregnant women face living in rural Oklahoma.

Shattuck, a town 170 miles outside of Oklahoma City, is a community of about 1,200 people. Not much but open fields surround the rural Ellis County town, but within it is a married couple that is looking to help change this reality for expecting mothers.

“I think that maternity care has been put on the backburner a little too long, and we need to bring it to the forefront,” Amy Vasko, certified nurse midwife at Newman Memorial Hospital, said. “These women deserve better, and we want to bring it to them.”

Amy helps women from all across northwest Oklahoma get access to prenatal care in a place where options are few.

“I have people ask me all the time, ‘Where do people go to have babies around here?’ Because there just really isn’t any place,” said McKayla Trout, who was one of Amy’s patients.

There are only a handful of OB-GYNs that provide care for women in northwest Oklahoma, with INTREGRIS Health offering care in Woodward and Enid.

A report on maternity care by the March of Dimes said that 52% of counties in Oklahoma are classified as maternity care deserts, areas without access to birthing facilities or prenatal providers.

Some women travel hundreds of miles just to get obstetric care.

“Every one I know travels at least two hours,” Trout said.

But in the small town of Shattuck, Amy and her husband, Tom Vasko, are working to change that across the state.

“These types of services, especially in a pro-life state, should be accessible in a community,” Tom, CEO and administrator of Newman Memorial Hospital, said.

Tom and Amy moved to Shattuck to help revolutionize rural health care in northwest Oklahoma. One part of that was bringing a labor and delivery center back to Newman Memorial Hospital.

“We’re definitely right on the brink of that,” Tom said.

Right now, Amy provides prenatal care for mothers up until 26 weeks. Her patients then have to be transferred to a delivering physician.

“I do have women coming from Texas and Kansas, and all the way up into the Panhandle,” Amy said.

About 25% of Oklahoma is in Newman Memorial Hospital’s service area. While it helps fill a critical need in the area, families often drive up to three hours when transferred out of Amy’s care.

“I’ve had patients that come from the Kansas line, so when they leave me, they end up going into Kansas to deliver, because they can’t deliver in their own home state,” Amy said.

Trout, who gave birth to Haidyn in 2024, made the nearly three-hour drive to Oklahoma City to see her OB-GYN after reaching 26 weeks.

“I would drive three hours there, be there for 10 minutes and turn around and drive three hours back, which when you’re 36 weeks pregnant is a lot of car time,” Trout said.

Trout opted to be induced instead of facing the unknowns of going into labor hours away from her OB-GYN, a choice many women in rural Oklahoma often have to make.

“That was one of my biggest worries, especially later on in my pregnancy, was if I go into labor, am I going to make it to the hospital?” Trout said. “On top of all of the stress that you have with becoming a first-time mom, being that far away from your doctor just added on to all of it.”

Maternity care deserts don’t just put stress on moms and families. They also create a strain on the hospitals that do provide labor and delivery services.

“The closest place to here was Elk City, and I actually did call them to see if I could transfer my care there after my first 26 weeks, and he was already full, because everyone around here goes either there or Oklahoma City,” Trout said.

Traveling far is a barrier that some women can’t overcome, and Amy said they will often skip necessary appointments instead of making the drive.

“Sometimes it could come down to, ‘Am I going to pay for the $60 gas tank to get to the city or am I going to put food on the table?’ And like everybody else, I’d put food on the table,” Amy said.

Bringing a labor and delivery center back to Shattuck would allow Amy to see those patients all the way through their pregnancy alongside two OB-GYNs who have already agreed to join the hospital’s staff.

“If Amy sees a patient out along the 25% of the state right now that doesn’t have maternity health, which is our district, then the delivery would happen here at Newman,” Tom said.

The move would allow hundreds of babies to be born in northwest Oklahoma, saving time, money and potentially lives.

“We are trying to inject a model that Oklahomans and Oklahoma hasn’t seen before,” Tom said. “Because we want to set the example of how maternity care should be delivered in modern-day America.”

The Vaskos teamed up with state lawmakers to create Senate Bill 222. It would form the Maternity Care Pilot Program that would allow a hospital to receive a $5 million grant to create a labor and delivery unit.

If the bill passes the Legislature, is signed into law and Newman Memorial Hospital is awarded the $5 million, the hospital will buy technology and equipment for a labor and delivery center, and it will help the couple fulfill their promise to bring births back to northwest Oklahoma.

“We’re talking about $5 million. It’s a lot of money. But in the grand scheme of things of how many lives it would save and touch and the economic value it brings to our communities, the return is just 100-fold,” Tom said.

The goal isn’t just to improve health care for families in northwest Oklahoma. They hope to take the care model and help other rural hospitals across the state.

“What the plan is to take that playbook into other communities in the state and start to end these maternity crises,” Tom said.

Senate Bill 222 was referred to the Senate Health and Human Services Committee. The committee meets on Monday, but the bill is not on that agenda.

Anyone interested in helping the couple’s efforts can send donations to the Newman Memorial Hospital Foundation at 905 South Main Street, Shattuck, OK 73858.

This story was updated to include the OB-GYNs located in Woodward and Enid.

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