Thursday, November 21, 2024
11/21/2024
Address: 421 Montgomery St. 9th floor, Syracuse, NY 13202-2960 Project Director: Sunny Jones Contact Phone: Ph: (315) 435-2920 Fax: (315) 435-2678 Email Address: Sunnyjones@ongov.net Website: www.onhealthyfamilies.com Funding Requested: Yr. 1: $1,100,000 Yr. 2-5: $1,100,000 The Onondaga County Health Department (OCHD) is applying for the Healthy Start Initiative: Eliminating Disparities in Perinatal Health as a Continuation Project of Syracuse Healthy Start (SHS), and proposes to strengthen and expand on the successes of the past 25 years. SHS is a community-based initiative that aims to reduce infant mortality, decrease racial and ethnic health disparities, improve perinatal outcomes, and address the adverse impact of the social determinants of health in the target area. Based in the City of Syracuse, an urban area in Upstate New York, the project has served high-risk families since 1997. While great strides have been made to address disparities in perinatal health outcomes in Syracuse, the Infant Mortality Rate (IMR) for non-Hispanic (NH) Black/African American (AA) residents of the project area remains high. From 2019-2021, the IMR for NH Black/AA residents of the project area was 13.4 per 1,000 live births. There was a total of 30 NH Black/AA infant deaths during that time frame. This rate is nearly 2.5 times the national average (Source: National Vital Statistics Reports Volume 71, Number 05 September 29, 2022 (cdc.gov)) and more than six times the rate among NH White residents during the same period (2.2 per 1,000 live births) (source: OCHD Vital Records and SPDS). The target population for SHS is NH Black/African American pregnant and post-partum women, infants, and their families for the first 18 months after birth residing in Syracuse. SHS is well positioned within OCHD to improve the health of the target population by providing comprehensive quality services with the principles of health equity, strengthened fa mily resilience, achievement of collective impact, and increased accountability through quality improvement, performance monitoring, and evaluation. The program will continue to reach high-risk women and their families through outreach, health education and perinatal services; and implement care coordination through case management utilizing teams of trained Public Health Nurses, a Public Health Social Worker, and Community Health Workers (CHW). SHS continues to build strong collaborative relationships with a network of community agencies and providers with proven track records of accountability and commitment to achieve collective positive impacts for the target population. Health Information Technology will further facilitate and improve access to comprehensive healthcare services to more women, infants, children and families through the first 18 months after birth. Over the next five years, SHS will expand the Community Action Network as the new Community Consortium (CC) to further promote existing strategies, while implementing new initiatives to reduce racial and ethnic disparities in perinatal birth outcomes. These will be accomplished and supported with increased community voice through strong collaborations with community-facing partner agencies serving those with lived experience. The CC will educate and inform SHS programs providing direct and enabling services, increase participation in community coalitions, and identify specific sites in the project area where health education may be the most needed. The project will support community doula services and will fund a Fatherhood CHW position to promote the importance of partner involvement. SHS has been at the forefront of the community addressing IMR, health disparities, and family resilience in Syracuse for 25 years and will remain a force for change in the years to come.
HHS’ Tracking Accountability in Government Grants System (TAGGS) website provides access to detailed descriptions of grants, loans, aggregated direct payments and other types of financial assistance awarded by the HHS Operating Divisions (OPDIVs) and the Office of the Secretary Staff Divisions (STAFFDIVs).
