Thursday, April 18, 2024
4/18/2024
The purpose of this project is to strengthen the surveillance of birth defects in Utah through funding and guidance from NOFO CDC RFA DD21 2101 Advancing Population Based Surveillance of Birth Defects. This funding supports the Utah Birth Defect Network within the Office of Children with Special Healthcare Needs in the Division of Family Health of the Utah Department of Health and Human Services. UBDN is a statewide population based surveillance system that seeks to prevent birth defects and secondary disabilities by (1) monitoring occurrence (2) referring to services (3) facilitating research and (4) providing education and outreach. Under Utah administrative rule R398.5 all hospitals and birthing centers located in Utah are required to report a specific set of information to UBDN any time a baby is born with a birth defect. Once UBDN receives a report of a birth defect additional information is collected about the mother and infant. Analysis of this secured and deidentified data is then performed by an epidemiologist to identify trends and risk factors of birth defects in Utah. Funding and guidance provided by CDC RFA DD21 2101 will allow UBDN to (1) strengthen surveillance capacity (2) respond to emerging threats affecting mothers and pregnancies (3) improve the timeliness of case identification (4) improve data quality (5) utilize the UBDN surveillance data in identification and dissemination of information to affected populations for primary and secondary prevention and (6) improve outcomes of affected individuals. UBDN will also continue to collect data on Critical Congenital Heart Defects as part of its surveillance activities. The Utah CCHD Screening Program manages a statewide CCHD screening data collection system that has systematically collected data on the timing and mode of CCHD detection including prenatal diagnosis and pulse oximetry results. Utah CCHD Screening Program educates healthcare providers about CCHD to improve the scree ning process. With this funding UBDN will strengthen current surveillance of CCHDs using active case finding with case verification while continuing to educate health care providers on the importance of screening for CCHDs and analyzing data for protocol errors.
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).
