Obstetrics

The odds that a woman who is raped will get pregnant are "one in millions and millions and millions," said state Rep. Stephen Freind, R-Delaware County, the Legislature's leading abortion foe. The reason, Freind said, is that the traumatic experience of rape causes a woman to "secrete a certain secretion" that tends to kill sperm. Two Philadelphia doctors specializing in human reproduction characterized Freind's contention as scientifically baseless. Freind made the statement on a central Pennsylvania radio interview program earlier this month.

Helen Dickens, 92, who smashed through the dual barriers of racism and sexism in the field of obstetrics and gynecology, died Sunday at Hahnemann University Medical Center of complications after suffering a stroke. She had lived in Center City. She also lived in North Philadelphia and Yeadon in her adult life. It is impossible to separate the word first from Dr. Dickens and her work. She was the first black woman in the country named a fellow by the American College of Surgeons and the first elected to the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology.

Samuel F. Rudolph Jr., 80, obstetrics chief at Bryn Mawr Hospital for two years in the 1980s, died Tuesday, Aug. 28, of heart failure at the hospital. Dr. Rudolph retired from medical practice in the early 2000s, his son Richard said. "What he loved most was helping women bring new life into the world," his son said. "He was a very accomplished person in a number of areas," his son said, but "what was very touching about him was that he was so humble. You never heard him talking about it. "It was what he did. It was what he was. " Born in Upper Darby, Dr. Rudolph graduated from Upper Darby High School in 1950 and, with a basketball scholarship, earned a bachelor's degree in premedical studies at Muhlenberg College in 1954.

Women planning to deliver their babies at the Central Division of Metropolitan Hospital will have to look elsewhere beginning Feb. 17. The financially ailing facility at 201 N. 8th St. plans to stop deliveries on that date, according to spokeswoman Barbara DeLuca. "The obstetrical service will be suspended . . . due to the low volume of babies delivered," DeLuca said yesterday. Fewer than 300 babies were born at the Central Division in 1988. DeLuca said Metropolitan would continue operating the obstetrical departments at the Springfield and Parkview Divisions.

Dr. Ralph H. Van Meter, 77, the chief of obstetrics and gynecology at Memorial Hospital of Burlington County in Mount Holly for more than 20 years, died Friday at the hospital. A 1944 graduate of Temple University School of Medicine, Dr. Van Meter completed his internship and residency at Pennsylvania Hospital in Philadelphia. He then came to Moorestown in 1949 to begin his medical practice. While attending medical school, Dr. Van Meter worked at the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard to earn money for his training.

The Elkins Park Hospital will eliminate its money-losing obstetrics department starting next month, so that it can focus resources on departments such as orthopedics, cardiology and vascular surgery. The hospital's decision to stop delivering babies as of June 25 is the result of reduced demand for the service, according to hospital officials. The officials added that it was not related to soaring malpractice rates for physicians and higher medical-liability costs for hospitals in the Philadelphia region.

On the morning of her Caesarean section, Tyriesha Tucker met the woman who would deliver her baby - obstetrician Hyun-Joo Lee - for the first time. That was fine with Tucker, a tiny woman who was 41 weeks pregnant with her second child. She didn't care whether she had a long relationship with the doctor who would cut into her womb that day. What mattered, she said, was that her doctor knew what she was doing. By early afternoon, Lee, whose job was to care for all the women in labor on Albert Einstein Medical Center's busy maternity floor that day and night, was furiously scrubbing her hands and arms for Tucker's surgery.

New Year's Eve and morning were like most other days for the doctors, nurses, and other staff members at the obstetrics programs at area hospitals: busy. Fifteen hospitals in the eight-county Philadelphia region have closed their labor and delivery units since 1999, including two last year. Those hospitals delivered 20 percent of the 65,928 babies born here in 1999, and the closures have left the hospitals that still deliver babies scrambling to take up the slack. And in 2010, two more hospitals - Lourdes Medical Center of Burlington County and Mercy Suburban Hospital in East Norriton - plan to close their OB units, putting even more pressure on those that remain.

Vagina envy is real. So, instead of leaving well enough alone, some women are opting to get a so-called designer vagina and undergoing labiaplasties to contour floppy, protruding inner lips. Some also are seeking liposuction to slim fatty pubic mounds. Although some patients request medical intervention because the way their bodies are configured makes them feel uncomfortable riding bicycles or doing other physical activities, the single biggest reason women request genital cosmetic surgery is aesthetics.

Howard Lees Kent, 69, a Thomas Jefferson University clinical professor and internationally recognized authority in his field, died Sunday of injuries from an automobile accident in Monroe Township. He had lived in Hammonton since 1963. He was born and raised in Norristown. Dr. Kent had been a clinical professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Thomas Jefferson in Philadelphia since 1982. He was one of the few experts on the diseases of the vagina and vulva, said Thomas A. Klein, also a professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Jefferson.

Samuel F. Rudolph Jr., 80, obstetrics chief at Bryn Mawr Hospital for two years in the 1980s, died Tuesday, Aug. 28, of heart failure at the hospital. Dr. Rudolph retired from medical practice in the early 2000s, his son Richard said. "What he loved most was helping women bring new life into the world," his son said. "He was a very accomplished person in a number of areas," his son said, but "what was very touching about him was that he was so humble. You never heard him talking about it. "It was what he did. It was what he was. " Born in Upper Darby, Dr. Rudolph graduated from Upper Darby High School in 1950 and, with a basketball scholarship, earned a bachelor's degree in premedical studies at Muhlenberg College in 1954.

Vagina envy is real. So, instead of leaving well enough alone, some women are opting to get a so-called designer vagina and undergoing labiaplasties to contour floppy, protruding inner lips. Some also are seeking liposuction to slim fatty pubic mounds. Although some patients request medical intervention because the way their bodies are configured makes them feel uncomfortable riding bicycles or doing other physical activities, the single biggest reason women request genital cosmetic surgery is aesthetics.

New Year's Eve and morning were like most other days for the doctors, nurses, and other staff members at the obstetrics programs at area hospitals: busy. Fifteen hospitals in the eight-county Philadelphia region have closed their labor and delivery units since 1999, including two last year. Those hospitals delivered 20 percent of the 65,928 babies born here in 1999, and the closures have left the hospitals that still deliver babies scrambling to take up the slack. And in 2010, two more hospitals - Lourdes Medical Center of Burlington County and Mercy Suburban Hospital in East Norriton - plan to close their OB units, putting even more pressure on those that remain.

Salvatore J. Cucinotta, 96, of Cherry Hill, a decorated World War II battlefield physician who delivered babies in South Philadelphia for more than 50 years, died Sunday at home. Dr. Cucinotta's parents moved to the United States from Sicily when he was a toddler. Growing up, he helped out in the family's cheese store in the Italian Market. He graduated from Roman Catholic High School, earned a bachelor's degree in biology from Villanova University, and graduated from Hahnemann University Medical School.

On the morning of her Caesarean section, Tyriesha Tucker met the woman who would deliver her baby - obstetrician Hyun-Joo Lee - for the first time. That was fine with Tucker, a tiny woman who was 41 weeks pregnant with her second child. She didn't care whether she had a long relationship with the doctor who would cut into her womb that day. What mattered, she said, was that her doctor knew what she was doing. By early afternoon, Lee, whose job was to care for all the women in labor on Albert Einstein Medical Center's busy maternity floor that day and night, was furiously scrubbing her hands and arms for Tucker's surgery.

On the morning of her Caesarean section, Tyriesha Tucker met the woman who would deliver her baby - obstetrician Hyun-Joo Lee - for the first time. That was fine with Tucker, a tiny woman who was 41 weeks pregnant with her second child. She didn't care whether she had a long relationship with the doctor who would cut into her womb that day. What mattered, she said, was that her doctor knew what she was doing. By early afternoon, Lee, whose job was to care for all the women in labor on Albert Einstein Medical Center's busy maternity floor that day and night, was furiously scrubbing her hands and arms for Tucker's surgery.

There is no obstetrical crisis in the Philadelphia area, Gov. Rendell's office has concluded. But there are problems, and "trends suggest that health-care systems may face significant challenges in finding OB-GYNs to deliver the babies born in the five-county area," Donna Cooper, Rendell's policy secretary, wrote in a letter to Philadelphia political leaders who had asked her office to look into the issue. Since 1997, 13 area hospitals have stopped delivering babies. Hospital and political leaders have labeled the trend a "crisis.

After more than 50 years of bringing new life into the world, the labor and delivery unit at Jeanes Hospital in Northeast Philadelphia closed for good May 31. From now on, expectant mothers will have to give birth somewhere else, no matter how far the drive or how dangerous the wait. Chalk up another "victory" for personal-injury lawyers and the medical-liability crisis they have visited upon Pennsylvania. Jeanes is just the latest Pennsylvania hospital to end obstetric care due in large part to medical-liability concerns.

Is another Philadelphia-area hospital getting out of the baby business? Chestnut Hill Hospital is reviewing its obstetrics program, raising concerns among hospital staff and others in the region that it will copy Jeanes Hospital's recent decision to close its maternity ward. If that happens, Chestnut Hill would be the 15th area hospital in the last decade to stop delivering babies, a trend some are calling a crisis that could soon affect access to care and quality of treatment for pregnant women and babies here.

Dr. Burton L. Wellenbach, 84, of Haverford, an emeritus professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Thomas Jefferson University who helped bring new life into the world for more than 40 years, died of complications of an infection Wednesday at Bryn Mawr Hospital. "Everywhere I go," his daughter-in-law Tricia Wellenbach said, "if women hear my last name, they come up to me and tell me that my father-in-law had delivered them, or their children, or their grandchildren. " Sometimes, she said, he delivered all three generations.