The Lifecycle Wellness and Birth Center in Bryn Mawr is closing after 47 years and 16,000 babies, writes Nicole Leonard for WHYY.
The Center will stop delivering babies by Feb. 15. Other services, including prenatal, postpartum, gynecology, lactation support, and mental health services, will gradually close in February and end by late March.
Lifecycle Wellness was one of Pennsylvania’s first licensed independent birthing centers.
Center leaders announced the closing “with very heavy hearts” on social media and on their website Thursday. They named financial challenges and regulatory changes that have made it difficult to keep the center open.
“Despite our best efforts to adapt our model through partnerships, operational efficiencies, and advocacy, these pressures have grown too great to sustain,” wrote Jessi Schwarz, executive and clinical director, and Lauren Harrington, board president, in a statement to the community.
The birth center particularly helped women with healthy, low-risk pregnancies who wanted an alternative to delivering in a hospital.
Shifts in public health and “rising rates of medical complications have reduced the number of families eligible for this model of care,” the providers said.
Read more about the different challenges the Lifecycle Wellness and Birth Center faces these days at WHYY.
