Two Wichita businesses are focusing on helping women as patients and parents

A couple of businesses have opened in Wichita to help women as patients and parents.

Unlike a lot of people who open businesses, Samantha Goodell never planned to.

“Originally, I would never have thought I was going to be a business owner.”

Her new Miracle Moments Midwifery kind of grew naturally, which is fitting because much of her career has been about offering natural births.

Goodell has a doctor of nursing practice degree from Baylor University and is a certified midwife and former labor and delivery nurse.

She has worked in a variety of capacities in a number of places, including with high-risk deliveries.

Most recently, Goodell has been working with Born Midwifery Center for Birth, and now her new business is an affiliate of it, sharing its space at 910 S. Hillside.

Miracle Moments Midwifery is a birthing practice specializing in deliveries outside of hospitals.

Goodell said there is a lot of research that shows for women who give birth outside of hospitals, “It’s actually a safer model for them.”

She said with lowered interventions and fewer inductions there also are lower rates of tears and C-sections and also improved breast-feeding rates.

Goodell said her practice is about supporting and empowering women.

“It’s just important to educate women so they can make informed choices about what’s available to them.”

Miracle Moments Midwifery offers a variety of pregnancy-related services, including well-woman care, infertility assistance, hormone management, in-home lactation and birth control.

Goodell said a lot of women don’t necessarily feel heard when it comes to their health, and she’s on a mission to change that, in part through longer appointments and more individualized care.

In the end, she said, it’s all about “improved outcomes for both moms and babies.”

Another relatively new business designed to help new parents is Let Mommy Sleep of Wichita.

The postpartum care business opened in Wichita last year with a franchisee, but founder of the company Denise Iacona Stern is now representing the business.

Stern had a 17-month-old son years ago when she then gave birth to twins.

“I was very sick when my girls were born, and I needed help,” she said. “The need for overnight care was demonstrated to me personally.”

With a business background, she said, “Opening the business was familiar territory for me.”

However, she said there was a reaction like, “Oh, a mom started a business. How cute.”

Stern said she found it “sort of infantilizing.”

The business became known for overnight care, typically 10 p.m. to 6 a.m. It’s not a sleep-training service for babies, though Stern said that’s a natural byproduct.

“We’re there to do any and all care of the child so the mother can recuperate.”

That includes offering tips on breast-feeding.

Stern said generally after a woman gives birth, there’s not another doctor’s visit for six weeks.

“We want to be there to help her physically and mentally.”

Stern said that extra help can minimize hospital readmissions.

When she started the business in 2010, Stern said people didn’t talk about postpartum care as widely, so it was hard for some to grasp.

“What, somebody comes to your house, but you’re there?”

Others “automatically think of it as a luxury service,” she said, but she said that’s not what it is.

Stern said so many women have been caught between being well and being sick.

“We just never knew it because people weren’t sharing these stories”

Stern said a lot of times, new parents don’t live near family who can help or the second parent may have a demanding job and can’t help either.

“We really try to look at it from the health aspect of helping families.”

Stern lives in Virginia and now has more than a dozen of the franchises nationally.

She said it was clear people need the help.

“The business really took off unexpectedly.”