The 130th Annual Meeting of APHA

Abstract #36746

Ellen M Hutchins, ScD, MSW, Department of Health and Human Services, Maternal and Child Health Bureau/HRSA, Parklawn Bldg - Room 11A-05, 5600 Fishers Lane, Rockville, MD 20857, 301/443-9534, Ehutchins@hrsa.gov and Kathleen Buckley, MSN, CNM, Director, National Fetal and Infant Mortalty Review Program, 409 12th Street, SW, Washington, D.C., DC 20024.

The Maternal and Child Health Bureau (MCHB) promotes the approach that the death of an infant during the first year of life, a maternal death, or indeed any childhood death should be viewed as a sentinel event that serves as an indicator of a community's social and economic well-being as well as its health. These deaths also reflect the organization and abilities of existing health and human services as well as the array of its community resources.

MCHB supports the review of these deaths to organize community-level or statewide quality-assurance or continuous quality improvement efforts to assure that the needs of women, infants, children, and families are met. A recent study by Johns Hopkins University supports that the FIMR methodology has operationalized this viewpoint at the community level.

States are realizing as they implement FIMR that some components of FIMR can be relevant for other types of reviews. Reviews that may benefit from this action-oriented, quality improvement approach include MMR and CFR. This poster will describe local and state efforts to incorporate FIMR components into MMR and CFR reviews in Florida, New Jersey, and Michigan. At the end of this session, participants will be able to: · Describe the FIMR process · Discuss the components of the FIMR methodology that inform development of other reviews including MMR and CFR.

Learning Objectives:

• Understand the various components of the fetal and infant mortality review (FIMR) process.
• Discuss which components of FIMR may be transferable to other types of mortality reviews.
• Examine three state models that have successful transfered some FIMR components to either their child fatality review program or maternal mortality review to enhance it.

Keywords: Infant Mortality, Mortality

Presenting author's disclosure statement:
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.