Detroit program promises free prenatal care to cut preterm births
Nearly 500 Detroit children have died in homicides since 2000 — an average of nearly three dozen a year. Most were gun-related, and most were among children 14-18. Many youngsters just got in the way of a bullet intended for an adult, or for no one in particular.
Karen Bouffard wrote this report for The Detroit News a 2013 National Health Journalism Fellow. Other stories in the series include:
Parents' illiteracy a challenge
Mobile units take care right to kids
Detroit researchers look at causes of premature births
Program helps kids by helping moms be better parents
Infant mortality rate in Detroit rivals areas of Third World
Detroit is deadliest city for children due to prematurity, violence
Stressful childhood tied to future health risks
Duggan to tackle infant mortality in wake of News' study
Detroit children dying in culture of violence
Reports prompt new effort in Detroit to lower infant mortality
Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan (Photo by Todd McInturf/The Detroit News)
Prenatal care will be made available to every pregnant woman in Detroit, regardless of insurance coverage or financial status, under a plan to reduce the city’s high preterm birth rate that will be announced Thursday, The Detroit News has learned.
Details of the initiative, called Make Your Date, will be announced by Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan, Wayne State University and Detroit’s three largest health care systems: the Detroit Medical Center, Henry Ford Health System, and St. John Providence Health System.
The goal of the program is to ensure that all babies born in the city have a chance at a healthy start.
According to two sources familiar with the mayor’s plan, the program will ensure that all Detroit mothers-to-be receive a full range of prenatal services and other support, at no additional cost, to prevent preterm delivery, which occurs at a higher rate in the city than anywhere in America.
Prematurity can have deadly consequences for babies, including brain hemorrhages, collapsed lungs and failing organs.
Preterm birth is the leading killer of babies in Detroit, which has the highest infant mortality rate in the nation.
A Detroit News study published in January found Detroit has a higher death rate for children age 18 and younger than any U.S. city its size or larger — and the greatest number of deaths occur before the child’s first birthday.
The second greatest cause of death for Detroit children is homicide.
Following The News’ report, Duggan announced that he would roll out a plan in March to fight preterm births.
But it took weeks longer to reach agreement with a long list of partners that includes Meridian Health Plan, foundations and nonprofits in addition to the local health systems.
Details on the costs of the program and how it will be funded were still under wraps Wednesday, but health officials expect Michigan’s Medicaid expansion, called the Healthy Michigan Plan, to add thousands more low-income Detroit women to the Medicaid rolls.
Health experts predict the expansion will reduce preterm births by providing medical care for women before they are pregnant to control chronic conditions such as diabetes.
So many babies die in Detroit that the National Institute on Child Health and Human Development, through a collaboration with Wayne State University, located its Perinatology Research Branch at the Detroit Medical Center in 2002.
Thursday’s announcement will include the launch of a website and phone number for women to use to sign up for the Make Your Date program.
The article was originally posted in The Detroit News
Photo credit: Todd McInturf/The Detroit News