The Genesee County Healthy Start (GCHS) project proposes to serve as a Community-based Healthy Start program for the urban area defined as the Flint Urbanized Area in Genesee County, Michigan. Flint and the surrounding area have consistently experienced high African American infant mortality rates and notable disparities between African Americans and other races/ethnicities. The African American infant mortality (IM) rate in Genesee County was 13.4 (2019-2021 three-year moving average), compared to the white IM rate of 4.3. Infant mortality rates in the city of Flint are significantly greater than rates in in Genesee County, 10.6 White compared to 15.0 Black (2019-2021 three-year moving average). High infant mortality rates and disparities exist throughout the county, therefore services will be provided in the Flint Urbanized Area as designated by Census 2010 (Flint City, Flint Township, Mt. Morris, Burton, Clio, Fenton, Davison, Flushing, Swartz Creek, Grand Blanc). The GCHS project builds on over 20 years of lessons learned, using evidence-based approaches to focus on women’s health before, during and after pregnancy as well as other activities to strengthen familial resilience. These strategies will improve women’s health, improve family health and wellness, promote systems change, and assure impact and effectiveness of the program. The project will also increase accountability through quality improvement, performance monitoring, and evaluation. The purpose of the GCHS project is to reduce disparities in perinatal health among African American women and children from birth to eighteen months of age. Specifically, this project will address entry into prenatal care, low birth weight, very low birth weight, and infant mortality. GCHS will provide outreach, home visiting services, case management, care coordination, health education and promotion, and systems integration. Physical and behavioral/mental health screenings of program participants
will be completed to determine risk levels by utilizing an ecological approach. GCHS will implement activities aimed at improving comprehensive health outcomes for women and families such as reproductive life plans, parenting education, fatherhood services, and reinforcing existing protective factors. GCHS will facilitate access to comprehensive health and social services for Healthy Start families through existing community organizations and health systems by utilizing community-based approaches to service delivery. Community Health Workers will perform coordinated outreach focusing on neighborhoods and population identified as high risk based on data analysis. Case management, health education, depression screening, and interconceptional care services will be delivered in collaboration with Michigan’s Maternal-Infant Health Program (MIHP), an evidence-based home-visiting program for Medicaid eligible pregnant women and infants up to 12 months of age. The MIHP program aims to reduce infant mortality and improve health outcomes.