Objective:  The Hurricane Katrina disaster continues to mold the culture, demographics and health care environment in New Orleans.  Latinos have played a key role in the rebuilding of this city, arriving soon after the storm to seek employment.  Immigrant Latina women face unique challenges to those who were present for the disaster, in that they arrived to a devastated health infrastructure, and often encounter language barriers.  Data is needed to describe what the long-term effects disaster recovery experiences have on maternal health and utilization of services.

Design: Cross-sectional, descriptive study

Setting: Recruitment and data collection occurred at community prenatal care clinics, Healthy Start, and hospital prenatal classes in the Greater New Orleans area.

Patients/Participants: Prenatal women (n=220, 24-40 weeks gestation), currently enrolled in prenatal care and living in the Greater New Orleans area.

Methods: Measures analyzed included previous disaster exposure, perception of disaster recovery, depression (Edinburgh Depression Scale), post-traumatic stress disorder (Post-traumatic Checklist), and pregnancy-related distress (Lobel scale). Linear regression was used to model mental health outcomes, with adjustment for race, marital status, education, employment, age, and smoking.

Results:  Women interviewed were African American (70%), White (16%), or Hispanic (13%). Most are unmarried, between the ages of 20-25 years, and have an annual income of less than $15,000.  Latinas (N=29) were less likely to use Healthy Start than other women (p=0.02), and less likely to report receiving information about birth control (p=0.01) and using illegal drugs (p=0.05), yet there were no differences found in their reported satisfaction with prenatal care.  Immigrant women who were not fluent in English were more likely to report low social support and to say they didn’t have someone to talk to about their problems (p=0.01).  Latinas were less likely to smoke (p=0.02), less likely to exercise (p=0.01) and less likely to eat at least 3 fruits/vegetables a day. 

Conclusion/Implications for nursing practice: Pregnant Latina women report lower utilization of prenatal services and education related to family planning.   Immigrant women reported less social support and less health promoting behaviors than other groups.  Latinas are a particularly vulnerable population due to lower levels of education, potential language barriers and less utilization of social services than other racial/ethnic groups.  Health and social service provision may have to adapt to provide care to this unique population.

Keywords:  Latino, Disaster, pregnancy, health behaviors, social support