FULLERTON : St. Jude to Employ Prenatal Care Van

The James Irvine Foundation has given St. Jude Medical Center a $100,000 grant to help start a mobile prenatal care program for low-income women in north county, hospital officials announced.

The grant will cover operating expenses for the mobile program, which must be approved by state licensing officials, said Joan Furman, director of the hospital’s Care for the Poor Program. In addition, hospital funds have paid for a custom-designed prenatal care van that is expected to be ready in about eight weeks.

St. Jude’s received $250,000 in state tobacco tax revenue last year to operate the mobile prenatal clinic, which is designed to reach low-income women who, without a car and with other children to care for, might otherwise never receive prenatal care.

Each year, thousands of women in Orange County and the state receive no prenatal care--a practice which health experts say leads to high infant mortality rates and premature babies with serious but preventable problems.

When the mobile prenatal program gets under way, St. Jude’s van is to travel to local parks and community centers in north Orange County, offering free prenatal exams and distributing information to low-income women.

The new van is to be modeled after St. Jude’s “health-mobile,” a 36-foot medical van that for the last two years has provided free medical care to children of low-income families.