Community infant safe sleep and breastfeeding promotion and population level-outcomes: A mixed methods study.

PROBLEM: In the U.S., sudden unexpected infant deaths due to accidental suffocation and strangulation in bed are increasing. Though breastfeeding is a protective factor against sudden unexpected infant death, motivations to breastfeed often couple with unsafe infant sleep practices. Racial/ethnic disparities are present in sudden unexpected infant death, accidental suffocation and strangulation in bed, and breastfeeding. BACKGROUND: Promoting infant safe sleep and breastfeeding through community-level initiatives could address disparities in related outcomes. AIM: Investigate the relationship between community-level strategies and associated state-level outcomes for infant safe sleep and breastfeeding. METHODS: We employed an intervention mixed methods framework and exploratory sequential design. The qualitative component entailed a hermeneutical phenomenological framework to analyze key informant interview data from seven U.S. community-level providers participating in a practice improvement initiative. The quantitative component entailed descriptively analyzing infant safe sleep and breastfeeding indicators from the 2019 Pregnancy Risk Assessment Monitoring System and Ohio Pregnancy Assessment Survey. Qualitative and quantitative data were linked through embedded integration. FINDINGS: We identified two mixed insights: gaps in promotion and outcomes, and persistent disparities between infant safe sleep and breastfeeding promotion and outcomes. DISCUSSION: Our findings indicate conversational approaches could improve infant safe sleep and breastfeeding promotion, outcomes, and relative disparities. We find that community collaboration is needed to address organizational capacity limitations in promoting infant safe sleep and breastfeeding. CONCLUSION: Community-level organizations and providers should consider tailoring program offerings and care delivery to include conversational approaches and community collaboration to promote infant safe sleep and breastfeeding and decrease relative disparities in outcomes.

Community-based approaches to infant safe sleep and breastfeeding promotion: a qualitative study.

BACKGROUND: In the U.S., sudden unexpected infant deaths (SUID) due to accidental suffocation and strangulation in bed (ASSB) are increasing, with disparities by race/ethnicity. While breastfeeding is a protective factor against infant mortality, racial/ethnic disparities are present in its uptake, and motivations to breastfeed are also often coupled with non-recommended infant sleep practices that are associated with infant sleep deaths. Combining infant safe sleep (ISS) and breastfeeding promotion on the community level presents opportunities to address racial/ethnic disparities and associated socioeconomic, cultural, and psychosocial influences. METHODS: We completed a descriptive qualitative hermeneutical phenomenology using thematic analysis of focus group data. We examined the phenomenon of community-level providers promoting ISS and breastfeeding in communities vulnerable to ISS and breastfeeding disparities. We asked eighteen informants participating in a national quality improvement collaborative about i.) areas requiring additional support to meet community needs around ISS and breastfeeding, and ii.) recommendations on tools to improve their work promoting ISS and breastfeeding. RESULTS: We identified four themes: i.) education and dissemination, ii.) relationship building and social support, iii.) working with clients' personal circumstances and considerations, and iv.) tools and systems. CONCLUSIONS: Our findings support embedding risk-mitigation approaches in ISS education; relationship building between providers, clients, and peers; and the provision of ISS and breastfeeding supportive material resources with educational opportunities. These findings may be used to inform community-level provider approaches to ISS and breastfeeding promotion.

Maternity Care Clinicians' Experiences Promoting Infant Safe Sleep and Breastfeeding During the COVID-19 Pandemic.

OBJECTIVE: To explore the phenomenon of clinicians' perceptions and experiences of promoting infant safe sleep (ISS) and breastfeeding during the COVID-19 pandemic. DESIGN: Descriptive qualitative hermeneutical phenomenology of key informant interviews conducted as part of a quality improvement initiative. SETTING: Maternity care services of 10 U.S. hospitals from April through September 2020. PARTICIPANTS: Ten hospital teams, including 29 clinicians. INTERVENTION: Participants were part of a national quality improvement intervention focused on promoting ISS and breastfeeding. Participants were asked about challenges and opportunities promoting ISS and breastfeeding during the pandemic. RESULTS: We identified four themes summarizing the experiences and perceptions of clinicians promoting ISS and breastfeeding in the COVID-19 pandemic: Strain on Clinicians Related to Hospital Policies, Coordination, and Capacity; Effects of Isolation for Parentsin Labor and Delivery; ReevaluatingOutpatient Follow-Up Care andSupport; and AdoptingShared Decision-Makingaround ISS andBreastfeeding. CONCLUSIONS: Our results support the need for physical and psychosocial care to reduce crisis-related burnout for clinicians to encourage the continued provision of ISS and breastfeeding education, particularly while navigating capacity constraints. Our findings also suggest that clinicians perceived that parents may require additional support to enhance potentially limited ISS and breastfeeding education. These findings may be used to inform approaches to parental and clinician maternity care support in future public health crises.

Promoting social emotional development during the paediatric well-child visit: a demonstration project.

Supporting social emotional development, beginning at birth, can improve lifelong health. The American Academy of Paediatrics recommends 12 well-child visits between birth and age 3 years. Each well-child visit provides a unique opportunity to interact with and support families to promote social emotional development of children. Eighteen US paediatric practices joined a learning community to use improvement science to test and implement evidence-informed strategies that nurture parent-child relationships and promote the social emotional development of young children.Quality improvement methods were used to integrate 11 strategies into well-child visits between birth and age 3 years and measure the improvements with a set of outcome, process and balancing measures. Participation among the 18 paediatric practices was high with 72% of teams attending monthly webinars and 97% of teams attending the three learning sessions. Over 12 months, the percentage of children receiving age-appropriate social emotional development screens at participating practices' well-child visits increased from a baseline median of 83% to 93%.Current paediatric practice in the USA focuses primarily on cognitive and physical development, and paediatric providers are less familiar with established practices to screen for social emotional development and promote the caregiver-child relationship. This project suggests that improvement methods show promise in increasing the number of children who receive age-appropriate social emotional development screens or assessments at well-child visits.

Reframing the early childhood obesity prevention narrative through an equitable nurturing approach.

High-quality mother-child interactions during the first 2,000 days, from conception to age 5 years, are considered crucial for preventing obesity development during early life stages. However, mother-child dyads interact within and are influenced by broader socio-ecological contexts involved in shaping child development outcomes, including nutrition. Hence, the coexistence of both undernutrition and obesity has been noted in inequitable social conditions, with drivers of undernutrition and overnutrition in children sharing common elements, such as poverty and food insecurity. To date, a holistic life-course approach to childhood obesity prevention that includes an equitable developmental perspective has not emerged. The World Health Organization (WHO) Nurturing Care Framework provides the foundation for reframing the narrative to understand childhood obesity through the lens of an equitable nurturing care approach to child development from a life-course perspective. In this perspective, we outline our rationale for reframing the childhood narrative by integrating an equitable nurturing care approach to childhood obesity prevention. Four key elements of reframing the narrative include: (a) extending the focus from the current 1,000 to 2,000 days (conception to 5 years); (b) highlighting the importance of nurturing mutually responsive child-caregiver connections to age 5; (c) recognition of racism and related stressors, not solely race/ethnicity, as part of adverse child experiences and social determinants of obesity; and (d) addressing equity by codesigning interventions with socially marginalized families and communities. An equitable, asset-based engagement of families and communities could drive the transformation of policies, systems and social conditions to prevent childhood obesity.

A National Measurement Framework to Assess and Improve Sickle Cell Care in 4 US Regions.

OBJECTIVES: Coordinated measurement strategies are needed to inform collaborative approaches to improve access to and quality of care for persons with sickle cell disease (SCD). The objective of our study was to develop a multilevel measurement strategy to assess improvements in access to and quality of care for persons with SCD in 4 US regions. METHODS: From 2014 through 2017, regional grantees in the Sickle Cell Disease Treatment Demonstration Program collected administrative and patient-level electronic health record (EHR) data to assess quality improvement initiatives. Four grantees-covering 29 US states and territories and an SCD population of 56 720-used a collective impact model to organize their work. The grantees collected administrative data from state Medicaid and Medicaid managed care organizations (MCOs) at multiple points during 2014-2017 to assess improvements at the population level, and local patient-level data were abstracted from site-level EHRs at regular intervals to track improvements over time. RESULTS: Administrative data were an important source of understanding population-level improvements but were delayed, whereas patient-level data were more sensitive to small-scale quality improvements. CONCLUSIONS: We established a shared measurement approach in partnership with Medicaid and Medicaid MCO stakeholders that can be leveraged to effectively support quality improvement initiatives for persons with SCD in the United States.

The National Network of State Perinatal Quality Collaboratives: A Growing Movement to Improve Maternal and Infant Health.

State Perinatal Quality Collaboratives (PQCs) are networks of multidisciplinary teams working to improve maternal and infant health outcomes. To address the shared needs across state PQCs and enable collaboration, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, in partnership with March of Dimes and perinatal quality improvement experts from across the country, supported the development and launch of the National Network of PQCs National Network of Perinatal Quality Collaboratives (NNPQC). This process included assessing the status of PQCs in this country and identifying the needs and resources that would be most useful to support PQC development. National representatives from 48 states gathered for the first meeting of the NNPQC to share best practices for making measurable improvements in maternal and infant health. The number of state PQCs has grown considerably over the past decade, with an active PQC or a PQC in development in almost every state. However, PQCs have some common challenges that need to be addressed. After its successful launch, the NNPQC is positioned to ensure that every state PQC has access to key tools and resources that build capacity to actively improve maternal and infant health outcomes and healthcare quality.

Close to me: enhancing kangaroo care practice for NICU staff and parents.

PURPOSE: The benefits of kangaroo care (KC) are well supported by previously published studies, yet KC is offered inconsistently and faces obstacles in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). The March of Dimes designed Close to Me to facilitate and increase KC in NICUs. The program incorporates KC education for nurses and parents, as well as awareness and comfort components. The purpose of this study was to assess whether Close to Me increased favorable attitudes toward KC among nurses and parents, and changed nurse and parent behaviors to implement KC earlier, more often and for longer duration. SUBJECTS AND DESIGN: This study took place in 5 NICUs with 48 nurse participants and 101 parent participants. It used a pre-/postprogram implementation design for nurses and a nonequivalent comparison versus intervention group design for parents. METHODS: Nurses and parents were surveyed on knowledge, attitudes, perceived behavioral control, and behavior. Comparisons were made pre- and postprogram implementation for nurses and between intervention and comparison groups for parents. Nurse focus groups were conducted pre- and postimplementation and analyzed using a constant comparative analysis method. Parents recorded care behaviors and satisfaction in journals, which were analyzed similarly. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES/PRINCIPAL RESULTS: After the Close to Me intervention, nurses reported more positive attitudes toward KC (P = .04), increased transfer of ventilated babies from incubators to parents (P = .01), and more parents requesting KC. Parents who received Close to Me had greater knowledge about KC (P = .03) compared with those who did not. With the Close to Me intervention, all babies born at less than 28 weeks' gestation had KC by the age of 12 days, whereas without the intervention, some did not have KC until the age of 31 days (P < .05). CONCLUSIONS: March of Dimes Close to Me improved knowledge and behavior regarding KC in NICUs. By offering KC education to parents, providing KC awareness and comfort components, and providing information and encouragement on the benefits and feasibility of KC to nurses, hospitals can potentially promote earlier and more frequent use of KC, particularly with infants born less than 28 weeks' gestation.

A multistate quality improvement program to decrease elective deliveries before 39 weeks of gestation.

OBJECTIVE: Nonmedically indicated (elective) deliveries before 39 weeks of gestation result in unnecessary neonatal morbidity. We sought to determine whether implementation of a process improvement program will decrease the rate of elective scheduled singleton early-term deliveries (37 0/7-38 6/7 weeks of gestation) in a group of diverse community and academic hospitals. METHODS: Policies and procedures for scheduling inductions and cesarean deliveries were implemented and patient and health care provider education was provided. Outcomes for scheduled singleton deliveries at 34 weeks of gestation or higher were submitted through a web-based data entry system. The rate of scheduled singleton elective early-term deliveries as well as the rates of early-term medically indicated and unscheduled deliveries, neonatal intensive care unit admissions, and singleton term fetal mortality rate were evaluated. RESULTS: A total of 29,030 scheduled singletons at 34 weeks of gestation or higher were delivered in 26 participating hospitals between January 2011 and December 2011. Elective scheduled early-term deliveries decreased from 27.8% in the first month to 4.8% in the 12th month (P<.001); rates of elective scheduled singleton early-term inductions (72%, P=.029) and cesarean deliveries (84%; P<.001) decreased significantly. There was no change in medically indicated or unscheduled early-term deliveries. Neonatal intensive care unit admissions among scheduled early-term singletons decreased nonsignificantly from 1.5% to 1.2% (P=.24). There was no increase in the term fetal mortality rate. CONCLUSION: A rapid-cycle process improvement program substantially decreased elective scheduled early-term deliveries to less than 5% in a group of diverse hospitals across multiple states. LEVEL OF EVIDENCE: III.

Quality improvement opportunities to prevent preterm births.

Quality improvement initiatives have been successfully employed in many areas of medicine, but few have been implemented in preventing prematurity (or preterm birth), which continues to be one of the most common complications in obstetrics, and the leading cause of perinatal morbidity and mortality in the United States. Due to the complex nature of the causes of prematurity, developing and instituting a quality improvement program to prevent prematurity can be challenging. However, using proven quality improvement principles and techniques, along with institutional will and commitment, are invaluable in rapidly implementing evidence-based initiatives for the prevention of preterm births.

Family support and family-centered care in the neonatal intensive care unit: origins, advances, impact.

Family-centered care (FCC) has been increasingly emphasized as an important and necessary element of neonatal intensive care. FCC is conceptualized as a philosophy with a set of guiding principles, as well as a cohort of programs, services, and practices that many hospitals have embraced. Several factors drive the pressing need for family-centered care and support of families of infants in NICUs, including the increase in the number of infants in NICUs; growth in diversity of the population and their concurrent needs; identification of parental and familial stress and lack of parenting confidence; and gaps in support for families, as identified by parents and NICU staff. We explore the origins of and advances in FCC in the NICU and identify various delivery methods and aspects of FCC and family support in the NICU. We examine the research and available evidence supporting FCC in the NICU and offer recommendations for increased dissemination and for future study.

Disease progression in Hutchinson-Gilford progeria syndrome: impact on growth and development.

OBJECTIVES: Hutchinson-Gilford progeria syndrome is a rare and uniformly fatal segmental "premature aging" disease that affects a variety of organ systems. We sought to more clearly define the bone and weight abnormalities in patients with progeria as potential outcome parameters for prospective clinical trials. PATIENTS AND METHODS: We collected and analyzed longitudinal medical information, both retrospectively and prospectively, from a total of 41 children with Hutchinson-Gilford progeria syndrome spanning 14 countries, from the Progeria Research Foundation Medical and Research Database at the Brown University Center for Gerontology. RESULTS: In addition to a number of previously well-defined phenotypic findings in children with progeria, this study identified abnormalities in the eruption of secondary incisors lingually and palatally in the mandible and maxilla, respectively. Although bony structures appeared normal in early infancy, clavicular resorption, coxa valga, avascular necrosis of the femoral head, modeling abnormalities of long bones with slender diaphyses, flared metaphyses, and overgrown epiphyses developed. Long bones showed normal cortical thickness centrally and progressive focal demineralization peripherally. The most striking finding identified in the retrospective data set of 35 children was an average weight increase of only 0.44 kg/year, beginning at approximately 24 months of age and persisting through life, with remarkable intrapatient linearity. This rate is >2 SD below normal weight gain for any corresponding age and sharply contrasts with the parabolic growth pattern for normal age- and gender-matched children. This finding was also confirmed prospectively. CONCLUSIONS: Our analysis shows evidence of a newly identified abnormal growth pattern for children with Hutchinson-Gilford progeria syndrome. The skeletal and dental findings are suggestive of a developmental dysplasia rather than a classical aging process. The presence of decreased and linear weight gain, maintained in all of the patients after the age of 2 years, provides the ideal parameter on which altered disease status can be assessed in clinical trials.

Error reduction and performance improvement in the emergency department through formal teamwork training: evaluation results of the MedTeams project.

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the effectiveness of training and institutionalizing teamwork behaviors, drawn from aviation crew resource management (CRM) programs, on emergency department (ED) staff organized into caregiver teams. STUDY SETTING: Nine teaching and community hospital EDs. STUDY DESIGN: A prospective multicenter evaluation using a quasi-experimental, untreated control group design with one pretest and two posttests of the Emergency Team Coordination Course (ETCC). The experimental group, comprised of 684 physicians, nurses, and technicians, received the ETCC and implemented formal teamwork structures and processes. Assessments occurred prior to training, and at intervals of four and eight months after training. Three outcome constructs were evaluated: team behavior, ED performance, and attitudes and opinions. Trained observers rated ED staff team behaviors and made observations of clinical errors, a measure of ED performance. Staff and patients in the EDs completed surveys measuring attitudes and opinions. DATA COLLECTION: Hospital EDs were the units of analysis for the seven outcome measures. Prior to aggregating data at the hospital level, scale properties of surveys and event-related observations were evaluated at the respondent or case level. PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: A statistically significant improvement in quality of team behaviors was shown between the experimental and control groups following training (p = .012). Subjective workload was not affected by the intervention (p = .668). The clinical error rate significantly decreased from 30.9 percent to 4.4 percent in the experimental group (p = .039). In the experimental group, the ED staffs' attitudes toward teamwork increased (p = .047) and staff assessments of institutional support showed a significant increase (p = .040). CONCLUSION: Our findings point to the effectiveness of formal teamwork training for improving team behaviors, reducing errors, and improving staff attitudes among the ETCC-trained hospitals.