Doulas are guides for mothers and families to navigate their pregnancies, but there are few who are available to help the growing Hispanic population in Northwest Arkansas. Ozarks at Large's Eva Mundo has more.
Bilingual doulas can be a bridge between languages for clients and medical staff. Their complex roles are crucial to guide new mothers and families through pregnancy, labor and postpartum.
Annie Brown has been a bilingual doula for six years. As a native Spanish speaker, she has been doing volunteer work with the Hispanic community since she came to the U.S. 30 years ago. She says that her job began as a translator, helping Hispanic families with errands like paying their electricity or water bills.
She says that while she was working as a part-time community health worker for the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences, she heard about a new program being rolled out to become a doula.
Acerca de desarrollar el programa de la doula, yo quiero doula.
"And when they talked about rolling out this new program for doulas, I didn't even know what a doula was."
Entonces cuando, yo me gusta mucho. Y pues yo estaba haciendo eso.
"So the more they told me, the more I liked it. And I realized that's what I was already doing."
Entrenamiento, yo sí lo aproveché para la lactancia, y eso no era doula todavía.
"They started training us and I took full advantage. If they were training for lactation, I was there and I wasn't even a doula yet."
Entrenamiento para traducción y también entrenamiento, y todo eso me ayudó cuando entré al entrenamiento para hacer doula.
"They did a training for translation, which I also signed up for. And all of those things really helped me when I started training to become a doula."
Doulas work to support mothers throughout their pregnancies, as well as during labor and postpartum care. But Brown says that as a bilingual doula, her job becomes a bit more complicated.
La clave realmente siendo bilingüe es en tiempo de labor, porque tú eres exactamente la voz del cliente.
"Being bilingual, the key really is during labor, because that's when you become the voice of the client."
Hemos desarrollado una relación por teléfono, me mandan fotos, es una comunicación constante, más o menos por un periodo de dos o tres meses.
"And because we've built up such a strong relationship talking on the phone and they're sending me pictures, it's just a constant communication throughout a period of two to three months."
Entonces esto es un cierto confianza con el cliente. Entonces eso siempre me encanta todo mis mamás, no, a veces algunas me como su mamá. Entonces ha sido una gran parte a la traducción.
"So you gain a certain level of trust with your clients. And some of them even treat me like their own mothers, which really helps with the translation."
She says that oftentimes she has to rephrase her translations to comfort her clients through unfamiliarity with medical procedures like getting an epidural injection.
A veces una o dos o tres veces porque lo veo a la clínica y después de ahora me lo entiendo. Si no, mencioné esta forma, cambio de esta forma. Si esta forma, cambio de esta forma. Y yo también le digo al doctor, estoy viendo en otras formas, porque todo depende del país, todo depende de la educación, y también todo depende de qué posiblemente la mamá lo necesita una segunda vez, no, escuchar una una vez más.
"Sometimes I have to reinterpret things once or twice or three times because the client is just looking scared. And I tell her that if she doesn't understand one way, I'll explain it another way. And I also explain it to the doctor, because it all depends on the country, on their level of education, and maybe the mom just needs to hear it again."
Brown is a contractor for UAMS and works with Hispanic, Marshallese and American families, many with high-risk pregnancies. In her six years working with UAMS, she has helped about 150 babies. Brown is working with about a half a dozen clients a month, and she says that her job requires constant contact to nurture the relationship with each one. She also says that while she technically works alone, a big part of her success is collaborating with the given hospital's medical staff.
Yo no soy una cosa si por el estilo, yo trabajo en compañía, trabajamos como equipo, porque al final el doctor es el doctor, ellos son estudiado, las enfermeras están ahí constantemente, saben bastante, y yo soy un apoyo. Y en el caso de qué es bilingüe, no solamente soy el apoyo, pero también soy su voz.
"I'm not a doula who will just ask the doctor what they're doing. We're there to collaborate, to work as a team. At the end of the day they are the doctor. The nurses are there constantly and I'm there for support. And in my case, as a bilingual doula, to be the voice."
Rubi Madrid is the director of operations for the Doula Alliance of Arkansas and a bilingual provider. She also worked as a Spanish interpreter before becoming a doula.
"I was pregnant in 2022, and that's when I started, like, getting doula services by my friend. And she started telling me, you know, how things are options like getting cervical checks and inductions. I started noticing when I would go to interpret that for Hispanic women that didn't speak English, they didn't know was an option to be induced. So I was seeing a lot of, like, them getting scheduled for inductions, even though there was nothing medically wrong."
She says that language barriers are the biggest challenge in her job. This typically leads to other problems, like women feeling pressured into labor inductions and not knowing they are optional. Struggles with lactation support also occur. When lactation specialists don't speak Spanish, it takes more time for mothers to learn how to breastfeed. But Madrid says that to get through these challenges, she encourages her clients to ask questions. She also works to foster a good connection between them and their doctor.
"I'm like that in between person, kind of to get questions asked and give her, like, the right information."
As a bilingual doula, she works as a bridge between cultures as well as between languages. Madrid says this isn't just a vocational experience, it's a personal one, too.
"You know, even as a bilingual doula, I get scared. Walking into an OB that does not look like me isn't familiar with my cultural needs. We want to bring awareness to what Hispanic women are feeling and, well, encouraging Hispanic women to hire doulas. Bilingual doulas. So they know what's going on and, you know, know you have somebody that's not just your provider, somebody that meets with you at your home, that's just a phone call away. To answer any concerns."
Madrid says she is involved in a training for Spanish speaking doulas led by the Childbirth and Postpartum Professional Association. She says that the training will take place in the spring and will be fully in Spanish, aiming to build an understanding of a doula's role in supporting mothers. Their ultimate goal is to expand accessibility to Spanish speaking doulas across the state, since it can be scary to navigate the medical system as a new mom coming from a different country.
Eva Mundo is one of our student reporters this year on Ozarks at Large, reporting on maternal and women's health in Arkansas. Support for her reporting comes from the Women's Giving Circle with the University of Arkansas.
Ozarks at Large transcripts are created on a rush deadline and edited for length and clarity. Copy editors utilize AI tools to review work. KUAF does not publish content created by AI. Please reach out to kuafinfo@uark.edu to report an issue. The audio version is the authoritative record of KUAF programming.
