Sunday, May 11, 2025
5/11/2025
Implementation of a Perinatal to Preschool (P2P) Behavioral Health Continuum - Mississippi Perinatal to Preschool (P2P) Behavioral Health Project This proposed project impacts (1) pregnant mothers and fathers at-risk for or who experience high-risk term and pre-term pregnancies and resulting in (2) infants being cared for in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) at the Children’s Hospital of Mississippi at the University of Mississippi Medical Center (UMMC) and one additional level III NICU managed by UMMC: Memorial Hospital Gulfport (MHG). Our proposal establishes the UMMC Perinatal Mental Health Program to meet the mental health needs of caregivers and their children. Broadly, Mississippi mothers report poorer mental health functioning compared to the rest of the nation and this risk is higher in women who deliver prematurely or experience birthing traumas. Mississippi mothers lack access to evidence-based perinatal mental healthcare as only 10 therapists exist with perinatal mental health expertise. Moreover, high-risk infants served at UMMC represent a broad spectrum of health conditions each conveying risk for myriad subsequent mental/behavioral health and/or developmental outcomes. Since 2018, our team has successfully implemented a behavioral health continuum for high-risk infants and their caregivers through our Behavioral Health in Infants and Preschoolers (BEHIP) program, but we have a need to expand services because the BEHIP program is only available at UMMC’s main campus. Providing mental health support along a continuum of care for caregivers of these high-risk children before and after delivery, and into their communities as they develop is critical to optimizing health, mental health and developmental outcomes. The proposed program of care for Mississippi’s high-risk term and pre-term infants will ensure that this population has access to a continuum of mental health services (promotion, prevention, assessment, and intervention) beginning prenatally, at UMMC’s NICU, extending to the NICU follow up clinic, and to the communities where families reside, including expanded services to the MS Gulf Coast to meet the needs of young children and their families across the state. The Perinatal to Preschool (P2P) program will establish the first perinatal mental health program in the state and will increase statewide capacity to deliver evidenced-based services to caregivers and their children prenatally and as they develop in their communities. We will conduct maternal pre/post-natal and infant screenings (Annually 560) and infant developmental evaluations (260), provide intervention to caregivers (45) and children using evidence-based interventions (160), provide promotion and prevention trainings using CARE (75), and train community providers in PCIT (25) who will further reach additional children in their communities across the state. Overall, this proposal fills critical gaps in our mental health workforce and system of care. The proposed program is synergistic with and will support key growth and development in grants at UMMC, but does not duplicate efforts. It ensures the valuable data obtained will result in sustainable statewide infant/child mental health care capacity.
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).