Dr. Tamika Sea, a Memphis native, holds a Bachelor of Science in Biology with concentrations in Comparative Women’s Studies and Visual Arts from Spelman College in Atlanta. Serving the Greater South Atlanta area at Piedmont Henry Hospital, she has held various administrative roles, including Chairman of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology.
Her areas of expertise include polycystic ovarian syndrome (PCOS), high-risk obstetrics, laparoscopy utilization, and pelvic floor reconstructive procedures. Outside her medical practice, she engages in community outreach with Spelman and her sisters in Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc.
She finds joy in painting, interior design projects, and spending time with loved ones and pets.
Dr. Sea discussed pressing issues concerning postpartum care for new mothers in the African American community with rolling out publisher and CEO Munson Steed.
[Editor’s note: This is an extended transcription. Some errors may occur.]
Munson Steed: Hey, everybody! This is Munson Steed and welcome to another edition of Health IQ, where we bring to you the biggest and the best healthcare providers, who are literally out there on the field. It is my pleasure to introduce you to the one, the only — standing ovation, please — Dr. Tamika Sea! How are you?
Dr. Tamika Sea: I’m doing well, thank you, Munson. Wonderful, wonderful introduction. Thank you.
MS: Thank you so much for coming on Health IQ. Just for all the community members hearing, and feeling, and listening to women and talking about maternal mortality, what should we know, and what should we be listening for? Particularly the first six weeks after pregnancy or delivery?
TS: So, the biggest concerns, especially regarding African Americans and our potential risk factors postpartum. Some of the big things that we wanna make sure that patients are looking out for are any signs and symptoms of elevation in blood pressure, swelling, medical conditions for which they already had previously during the pregnancy that seem to be worsening. Headaches, vision changes, dizziness, all types of symptoms that would lead us to potentially suspect, and also bring a patient in for evaluation for something like preeclampsia.
Heart disease can also affect us tremendously and disproportionately in our community. These are the things that we want patients to start looking for, making sure that these are not signs and symptoms that they are experiencing. And furthermore, anything that’s out of the normal. Please, please, please, make sure to ask the questions. Call your physician. There’s never a silly question. So, the big things are just looking for those signs and symptoms that we consider concerning, and making sure that you make your call to your physician.
MS: So, for all those who are watching Health IQ, and just don’t understand, the numbers are bad. They’re really, really bad and I know you kind of said it really quickly. But, if you would just kinda take us down the path of where blood pressure plays a role and we’re ignoring the blood pressure. And then, the family member knows, and is not necessarily playing their role, that you would like them to play in the person’s life.
Life-threatening concerns to beware
TS: This is a very good point that you’re making, Munson. The concerns are as African American women. We are disproportionately affected with hypertensive disorders associated with pregnancy. So, we’re much more inclined to have gestational hypertension, which is a pregnancy induced blood pressure disorder. Preeclampsia, which is a more severe pregnancy induced blood pressure disorder. Even things worse, as we discussed preeclampsia, is the precursor to eclampsia, which is an even more concerning and life-threatening disease process where seizures are associated with elevation and blood pressure.
So, we’re already disproportionately predisposed to those medical conditions intrapartum, during the pregnancy, antepartum, as well as postpartum. What we have to do as the village that takes care of these patients postpartum. The physicians, the moms, the dads, the aunts, the grandmothers, we have to be more diligent and look for those signs and symptoms. Oh, she’s been complaining of a headache for the last two days. Somebody at least let’s check her blood pressure. Let’s make sure that blood pressure is within normal range.
Swelling that’s out of the norm, vision changes, dizziness, shortness of breath, chest pain, because we also are disproportionately affected with cardiovascular disease, like I said during pregnancy and postpartum. These are the things that we need to pay attention to, and these are the things that we, as the village, should not ignore when these patients complain about these things. This is an opportunity for healthcare providers, family members,be an additional advocate for the patient, especially for a mom that just brought a baby home, is and significant others have you to step in and excited, tired, haven’t got any sleep.
There are possibilities that there are things that are overlooked and missed, because we just brush them off as being a part of the postpartum process. So, as the village, as the healthcare providers, as the family members, looking for those specific signs and symptoms. Ask the questions. Your physician should be very forthcoming to discuss with you. These are the signs that you need to be looking for and discuss with the family members and the significant others that are involved in the postpartum care of the patient.
MS: I love that you have so much. But here, at rolling out with Health IQ, I’d like to think of us as a vision, a village where we begin to change how we celebrate baby showers. I think baby showers are the moments that we should talk about our accountability. At least, if you’ve got eight women who’s week one and what your accountability is to the mother and the baby.
So if your mother has diabetes, if she has hypertension, if she’s alone, that we at least develop from that baby shower a checklist that is a mother shower. How do we shower her with advocacy during this baby shower? Do you think that changing some of our approaches to what we celebrate so that we’re really celebrating the life at the mom? Because it seems to be they talk about a baby shower, but the proper care, and though mission is, we’re losing black sisters.
TS: Absolutely.
MS: And everybody could have been with a party. A month early.
Prevention should begin at baby shower
TS: Absolutely! And I think you make such an excellent point. One of the issues is just kind ofttle bit backing up a li when it comes to the African American community. Culturally, there’s some things that we just do and they’re not necessarily health-forward. So, they’re different types of things that we have at baby showers. Salty foods, things that promote increasing those risk factors of things that we’re already at risk for, just genetically. And then, we, I don’t know how to say it. We look over or gloss over certain medical conditions because they’re so commonplace in our community.
Diabetes, hypertension. Everybody knows somebody in their family that has these things, and we don’t. I don’t wanna say that we don’t think that those things are important, cause I think that that’s not true. I think we do know that those things are important, but whether or not we are vigilant about people in our family that have these medical conditions and how that health care and how that health history affects us. I think those are the things that we probably don’t spend a lot of time on, and we don’t factor in.
Oh, wow! My mom has a history of hypertension. How does that affect me during pregnancy? We don’t make those connections, because I think we’re so overwhelmed with the fact that these medical conditions are commonplace in our community. But what we need to know is, hey, when you have that medical history. These are the things that you need to be paying attention to advocacy for yourself, self advocacy. And these are the things that I need to be paying attention to for Susie, my friend, who I’m going to her baby shower, and I know that her mom also has a history of hypertension.
These are the things that I need to do as an advocate for her: speak about them, make sure that she’s asking the proper questions when she goes to her doctor’s appointment, and make sure that she understands the risk associated with these things. Are we doing all the things necessary to help with prevention? One of the other big things that our community doesn’t focus on is prevention.
We focus on treatment after these medical conditions have already been diagnosed. But let’s work on prevention. What can we do? Stress. Stress increases the risk factors of a lot of these issues. What stresses Suzy, our new mom is about to experience. What is she already experiencing? These are the things that we as friends, family, people showing up at the baby shower. This is how we can advocate for Suzy. so to speak.
MS: Yeah. And I’m just thinking that, if you have six friends at your baby shower that each friend takes a week to…
TS: That’s a lovely idea.
MS: I’ll walk with you. I’ll be on the phone with you if you can’t make the doctor’s visit, And let’s just talk about the checklist that could be there, I think even to meditate with them all while there. Just so that, we’re reducing the triggers … the utility. The rationale that follows depression so somebody might fall off their medication.
TS: Absolutely.
MS: Might be too thirsty, and you don’t know why. You don’t ask those questions. So I think, as a true woman on the field, which you are on the field with moms. What would you like to say to mothers that really trigger them not to take care of themselves after they’ve had the baby?
TS: I mean, there’s so many factors. So the bigger concerns are, what are those societal factors that are implemented in our day to day lives that affects our capability of being able to administer self care to ourselves post delivery. You’re talking to people that are more likely having to go back to work, because when it comes to financial and fiscal responsibility. There’s a possibility that this mom has to go back to work within the next 4 to 6 weeks. And how do we factor that in? How do we factor in that mom might have other children that she also is trying to…
Make sure that we get those things taken care of on top of having another baby at home. The village, is there a significant other that’s present? Is that significant other present? Not just being there, but present. Actually, allowing for there to be some shift in responsibility, when it comes to the caretaking of the baby. There’s so many different factors. And then we haven’t even talked about mental health and how that affects the postpartum process, and what that looks like for black women, and how that looks different for black women than it does possibly for other ethnicities.
There’s so many factors. it’s really hard to even pin down a step-by-step checklist of things that moms need to be doing postpartum, in order to elicit a good postpartum process, decrease outcomes and risk factors, because there’s so many different factors that are out of the realm of your reach. But for me, what I try to do is look at it from a whole systems approach. I have a patient coming in. First and foremost, I like to get to know my patients. I like to get to know what their social issues may be. I like to know what problems may become a problem intrapartum and postpartum.
I like to know how the relationships are with their family members. I like to know who their village is gonna be. Do we already have some mental health concerns that already are present? That we need to make sure that we are not only advocating, but making sure that we’re addressing during the labor delivery and postpartum process. On top of the medical stuff, what other societal pressures are associated with that mom? And how is that mom going to be able to traverse these societal pressures postpartum..
So for me, it’s a whole systems approach. You gotta all of it. All of it is important. The work life balance, the who’s at home with you when it’s time for you to try to sleep. And who’s there to do the shift work with feeding the baby? Who’s there? Where is our village, and and who are the people that are in our village, and what their responsibilities are gonna be, what is their accountability to you? These are all things where these things are so important, it’s very hard to say one thing is important, because all of them affect how that mom traverses the postpartum process.
MS: And I love that answer ‘cause it’s true. You can’t treat half a mom. You gotta treat the whole mom.
TS: Absolutely.
MS: And then I think the society pressures are more on where I was kind of pushing with the baby shower. Like us celebrating just the gifts. Kinda keep the gifts wrapped, and let’s wrap ourselves around her with the strategy, knowing that if you’re at a baby shower, you might have a better insight of how much support she has? How much will she have after? So for me, here at rolling out. I’m hoping that we think of lifestyle changes, and not blame the mom at all.
TS: Absolutely.
MS: Showing up to a party, then make the party about her, not about the gifts, not about what you’ve spent, not about what you’re going to wear, but how you’re going to prepare her for the post. This is where lives are at stake, as we talk about maternal mortality. So…
TS: Absolutely.
MS: I’m so proud that you came on. I know this is something we’ve gotta be loud [about]. The other thing is just allowing moms to advocate honestly, to be able to share. So, who will be their sounding board at the baby shower that she can really lean into? Because it’s a lonely proposition to not only have the baby. But it’s a lonely proposition to not be responsible for another soul on top of the complex issues that all black women face about being superheroes at moments when they are able to rest.
And I think we should talk about rest. Who is gonna give moms the moment to rest during that? So at the baby shower, I think clearly those are the things I’d like to see. Clearly, you have all the medical areas covered. I do believe we are transitioning our celebrations to understanding how to celebrate the post-delivery of this child and this mother, to be able to find herself and surround herself with love. I’m Munson Steed and this has been Dr. Tamika Sea. And I am so proud of you. Thank you for being on Health IQ.
