Insights

Look for NICHQ at 2022 American Public Health Association Annual Meeting​

November 3, 2022

Join the National Institute for Children's Health Quality (NICHQ) on Nov. 6 at 2 p.m. for The Ever-Evolving Path to Equity in Children’s Health, a​ panel highlighting the evolution of NICHQ's equity work at the 2022 American Public Health Association Annual Meeting. The theme of this year's meeting is Leading the Path toward Equity – blending the legacy of APHA with innovative and exciting opportunities to help public health professionals and community advocates reach their goals.

NICHQ's panel will highlight the clinical and community equity approaches incorporated in a variety of our projects focused on sickle cell disease, safe sleep and breastfeeding/chestfeeding, infant and maternal mortality, and fatherhood and parent engagement work. 

NICHQ’S FALL CONFERENCES 
American Public Health Association: APHA 2022 Public Meeting and Expo - November 6-9, 2022 
American Evaluation Association: Evaluation 2022 - November 7-12, 2022 
Institute for Healthcare Improvement: IHI Forum – December 2022

The panel will be moderated by NICHQ Senior Project Director Stacey C. Penney, MSW, MPSH, and will feature the below NICHQ project leaders:

  • Dr. Meera Meenan – Sickle Cell Disease Treatment Demonstration Regional Collaboratives Program (SCDTDRCP) 2017-2021​
  • Dr. Stacy Scott – Changing the Narrative: ​Moving to a Community-led Safe Infant Sleep and Breastfeeding Network​
  • Kenn L. Harris – Healthy Start: Advancing Equity by Addressing Inequities Through a Community-based Program 

Topic: Sickle Cell Disease Treatment Demonstration Regional Collaboratives Program (SCDTDRCP) 2017-2021​

The Health Resources and Services Administration launched the Sickle Cell Disease Treatment Demonstration Program more than ten years ago. As we push to enhance access to services for people living with Sickle Cell Disease and improve and expand provider and patient education, NICHQ worked with five regional teams from across the country to deliver a comprehensive report to Congress detailing outcomes from the Sickle Cell Disease Treatment Demonstration Regional Collaboratives Program (SCDTDRCP).

The program addressed clinical and psychosocial needs to improve the health and quality of life of people with sickle cell disease, an inherited blood disorder that is more prevalent in individuals of African and Latinx/Hispanic descent and affects approximately 100,000 Americans.

NICHQ Associate Director of Research and Evaluation Meera Menon, PhD, will share about the regional work, which was broken up into three healthcare domains, and how regions and sites were able to identify barriers to care including systemic bias and racism.

Topic: Changing the Narrative: ​Moving to a Community-led Safe Infant Sleep and Breastfeeding Network​

The National Action Partnership to Promote Safe Sleep Improvement and Innovation Network (NAPPSS-IIN), funded by the Health Resources and Services Administration Maternal and Child Health Bureau, is working to make infant safe sleep and breastfeeding the national norm by aligning stakeholders to test safety bundles in multiple care settings to improve the likelihood that infant caregivers and families receive consistent, evidence-based instruction about safe sleep and breastfeeding.​

Hear from infant safe sleep expert Stacy Scott, PhD, MPA, NICHQ VP of Health Equity Innovation, as she describes elements needed for authentic collaboration and shared power structure, shares strategies to engage with community organizations around breastfeeding and infant safe sleep, and identifies comprehensive strategies to develop a community-level participatory quality improvement project that promotes breastfeeding and infant safe sleep practices.

Read More: 3 Lessons from Centering Community Voices in Safe Sleep and Breastfeeding Using a Quality Improvement Framework.

Topic: Healthy Start: Advancing Equity by Addressing Inequities Through a Community-based Program

Speaking to a community perspective, Kenn L. Harris, NICHQ VP of Engagement and Community Partnerships, will share successes and challenges in the Healthy Start program to achieve equity in infant & children’s health and discuss tools and strategies for infusing equity into maternal and child health programs. ​

Attendees will learn the history of the Healthy Start program and its roots in addressing inequities, hear about four current MCH convenings toward infant health equity, and learn more about the work of Healthy Start programs to engage communities most impacted by health disparities in shared learning and development. 

The Healthy Start TA & Support Center is operated by the National Institute for Children's Health Quality. This project is supported by the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) under grant number 1 UF5MC327500100 titled Supporting Healthy Start Performance Project. This information or content and conclusions are those of the author and should not be construed as the official position or policy of, nor should any endorsements be inferred by HRSA, HHS or the U.S. Government.​

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