🏥 According to a new list, not every NJ hospital is “best for maternity care”

🏥 The list looks at measures such as C-section rates and newborn complications

🏥 Expectant parents can use the list to help determine where to receive care

Maybe you don’t want to give birth in just the closest hospital to your home.

A brand new list from U.S. News & World Report indicates that the care of your newborn can vary significantly from hospital to hospital.

The “Best Hospitals for Maternity Care” list is based on measures such as rates of C-sections, breast milk feeding, early elective deliveries, and newborn complications.

“These hospitals have C-section rates that are 26% lower, and newborn complication rates that are 37% lower than unrecognized hospitals that participated in the survey,” said Jennifer Winston, health data scientist at U.S. News.

U.S. News also considered birthing-friendly practices in the hospitals, and whether facilities are transparent on racial/ethnic disparities.

U.S. News says their list is to meant to assist expectant parents, in consultation with their doctors, in making informed decisions about where to receive care.

New Jersey earned 19 entries on the 2024 list, and a couple entries include more than one hospital.

The list below is in no particular order — U.S. News & World Report does not rank the hospitals.

There are more New Jersey hospitals that make the cut than those that don’t.

NJ’s best hospitals for maternal care

Hackensack University Medical Center

⚫ Newborn complications: 2% to 2.6%

⚫ Fewer than 23.9% of low-risk full-term pregnancies were delivered by C-section

⚫ Transparent on racial/ethnic disparities, and recognized as Birthing-Friendly

Morristown Medical Center

⚫ Newborn complications: Fewer than 2% of lower-risk births

⚫ 58.5% of babies exclusively drank breast milk during their hospital stay

⚫ Excellent at minimizing avoidable C-sections

Overlook Medical Center (Summit)

⚫ Never or rarely schedules delivery earlier than recommended

⚫ 55.8% of babies exclusively drank breast milk during their hospital stay

⚫ Usually avoids C-sections

Jersey Shore University Medical Center (Neptune)

⚫ Routinely offers to support “vaginal birth after Cesarean”

⚫ 62.6% of babies exclusively drank breast milk during their hospital stay

⚫ Excellent at minimizing avoidable C-sections

Jefferson Health-Stratford/Cherry Hill/Washington Twp.

⚫ Never or rarely schedules delivery earlier than recommended

⚫ Routinely offers to support “vaginal birth after Cesarean”

⚫ Episiotomy rate (cut made in the vagina during birth) is low

Chilton Medical Center (Pompton Plains)

⚫ Newborn complications are rare

⚫ Routinely offers to support “vaginal birth after Cesarean”

⚫ Transparent on racial/ethnic disparities, and recognized as Birthing-Friendly

Clara Maass Medical Center (Belleville)

⚫ Newborn complications are very rare

⚫ Episiotomy rate (cut made in the vagina during birth) is low

⚫ Excellent at minimizing avoidable C-sections

Community Medical Center-Toms River

⚫ Never or rarely schedules delivery earlier than recommended

⚫ Newborn complications are rare

⚫ Excellent at minimizing avoidable C-sections

Englewood Hospital

⚫ 47.4% of babies exclusively drank breast milk during their hospital stay

⚫ Newborn complications are rare

⚫ Excellent at minimizing avoidable C-sections

Monmouth Medical Center-Long Branch Campus

⚫ Never or rarely schedules delivery earlier than recommended

⚫ Newborn complications are very rare

⚫ Routinely offers to support “vaginal birth after Cesarean” and excellent at minimizing avoidable C-sections

Newton Medical Center

⚫ Transparent on racial/ethnic disparities, and recognized as Birthing-Friendly

⚫ 47.4% of babies exclusively drank breast milk during their hospital stay

⚫ Excellent at minimizing avoidable C-sections

Ocean University Medical Center (Brick)

⚫ Never or rarely schedules delivery earlier than recommended

⚫ 47% of babies exclusively drank breast milk during their hospital stay

⚫ Excellent at minimizing avoidable C-sections

Palisades Medical Center (North Bergen)

⚫ Newborn complications are very rare

⚫ Transparent on racial/ethnic disparities, and recognized as Birthing-Friendly

⚫ Routinely offers to support “vaginal birth after Cesarean” and excellent at minimizing avoidable C-sections

Raritan Bay (Perth Amboy) and Old Bridge Medical Centers

⚫ Newborn complications are very rare

⚫ Episiotomy rate (cut made in the vagina during birth) is low

⚫ Routinely offers to support “vaginal birth after Cesarean” and excellent at minimizing avoidable C-sections

Riverview Medical Center (Red Bank)

⚫ Never or rarely schedules delivery earlier than recommended

⚫ 53.6% of babies exclusively drank breast milk during their hospital stay

⚫ Routinely offers to support “vaginal birth after Cesarean” and excellent at minimizing avoidable C-sections

Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital Somerset (Somerville)

⚫ Newborn complications are very rare

⚫ Transparent on racial/ethnic disparities, and recognized as Birthing-Friendly

⚫ Routinely offers to support “vaginal birth after Cesarean” and excellent at minimizing avoidable C-sections

Southern Ocean Medical Center (Manahwakin)

⚫ Newborn complications are very rare

⚫ Transparent on racial/ethnic disparities, and recognized as Birthing-Friendly

⚫ Excellent at minimizing avoidable C-sections

Virtua Mount Holly Hospital

⚫ Episiotomy rate (cut made in the vagina during birth) is low

⚫ Transparent on racial/ethnic disparities, and recognized as Birthing-Friendly

⚫ Routinely offers to support “vaginal birth after Cesarean” and excellent at minimizing avoidable C-sections

Virtua Voorhees Hospital

⚫ 54% of babies exclusively drank breast milk during their hospital stay

⚫ Never or rarely schedules delivery earlier than recommended

⚫ Routinely offers to support “vaginal birth after Cesarean” and excellent at minimizing avoidable C-sections

Report a correction 👈 | 👉 Contact our newsroom

CONMEBOL and CONCACAF announced last month that the June 20 opening game will be at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta, while South Florida’s Hard Rock Stadium landed the final.

The other sites revealed Monday: SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California; Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, California; Exploria Stadium in Orlando, Florida; Q2 Stadium in Austin, Texas; and two facilities in the Kansas City metro area: Arrowhead Stadium in Missouri and smaller Children’s Mercy Park on the Kansas side of the border.

Copa América is expanding in 2024, with six teams from North America joining the usual 10 nations from South America that compete for the continental championship. The format mirrors the Copa América Centenario in 2016, the only previous time the tournament was staged outside of South America.

For the 2024 edition, the CONMEBOL regulars will be joined by six CONCACAF qualifiers: the United States, Mexico, Jamaica and Panama plus the winner of March 23 playoff games between Costa Rica and Honduras, and between Canada and Trinidad and Tobago.

Two group-round games each will be played at MetLife Stadium (June 25 and 27); Hard Rock Stadium (June 23 and 29); Exploria Stadium (June 29 and July 1); Mercedes-Benz Stadium (the June 20 opener and June 27); AT&T Stadium (June 21 and 23); NRG Stadium (June 22 and 24); Q2 Stadium (June 20 and July 2); State Farm Stadium (June 28 and 30); Allegiant Stadium (June 26 and 28); SoFi Stadium (June 24 and 26) and Levi’s Stadium (June 22 and July 2).

Two groups games will also be played in the Kansas City area: June 25 at Children’s Mercy Park and July 1 at Arrowhead Stadium.

A mother and her 14-year-old daughter are advocating for better protections for victims after AI-generated nude images of the teen and other female classmates were circulated at a high school in New Jersey.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the country, officials are investigating an incident involving a teenage boy who allegedly used artificial intelligence to create and distribute similar images of other students – also teen girls – that attend a high school in suburban Seattle, Washington.

The disturbing cases have put a spotlight yet again on explicit AI-generated material that overwhelmingly harms women and children and is booming online at an unprecedented rate. According to an analysis by independent researcher Genevieve Oh that was shared with The Associated Press, more than 143,000 new deepfake videos were posted online this year, which surpasses every other year combined.

Desperate for solutions, affected families are pushing lawmakers to implement robust safeguards for victims whose images are manipulated using new AI models, or the plethora of apps and websites that openly advertise their services. Advocates and some legal experts are also calling for federal regulation that can provide uniform protections across the country and send a strong message to current and would-be perpetrators.

“We’re fighting for our children,” said Dorota Mani, whose daughter was one of the victims in Westfield, a New Jersey suburb outside of New York City. “They are not Republicans, and they are not Democrats. They don’t care. They just want to be loved, and they want to be safe.”

The problem with deepfakes isn’t new, but experts say it’s getting worse as the technology to produce it becomes more available and easier to use. Researchers have been sounding the alarm this year on the explosion of AI-generated child sexual abuse material using depictions of real victims or virtual characters. In June, the FBI warned it was continuing to receive reports from victims, both minors and adults, whose photos or videos were used to create explicit content that was shared online.

Several states have passed their own laws over the years to try to combat the problem, but they vary in scope. Texas, Minnesota and New York passed legislation this year criminalizing nonconsensual deepfake porn, joining Virginia, Georgia and Hawaii who already had laws on the books. Some states, like California and Illinois, have only given victims the ability to sue perpetrators for damages in civil court, which New York and Minnesota also allow.

A few other states are considering their own legislation, including New Jersey, where a bill is currently in the works to ban deepfake porn and impose penalties — either jail time, a fine or both — on those who spread it.

State Sen. Kristin Corrado, a Republican who introduced the legislation earlier this year, said she decided to get involved after reading an article about people trying to evade revenge porn laws by using their former partner’s image to generate deepfake porn.

“We just had a feeling that an incident was going to happen,” Corrado said.

The bill has languished for a few months, but there’s a good chance it might pass, she said, especially with the spotlight that’s been put on the issue because of Westfield.

The Westfield event took place this summer and was brought to the attention of the high school on Oct. 20, Westfield High School spokesperson Mary Ann McGann said in a statement. McGann did not provide details on how the AI-generated images were spread, but Mani, the mother of one of the girls, said she received a call from the school informing her nude pictures were created using the faces of some female students and then circulated among a group of friends on the social media app Snapchat.