CARE2 Quality Improvement Project Designed to Improve Maternal and Infant Health

Care2 logo with large text "Care2" with a cartoonish mother and baby between the 'e' and the '2'.  Then above in smaller text is "Care for Mothers" with "at Well Child Visits" below.

Care2 is a quality improvement project (QIP) designed to improve maternal and infant health during the interconception period. Care2 builds on the quality improvement science established by the IMPLICIT Network1, and is modified to meet the priorities and treatment needs of Ohio families.

The Ohio Infant Mortality Annual Report reveals Ohio’s infant mortality rate is significantly higher than the national average. In 2020, the infant mortality rate in Ohio was 13.6 deaths/1,000 live births for Black infants and 6.7 deaths/1,000 live births for all races,2 in comparison to the same year infant mortality rate in the United States of 5.4 deaths/1,000 live births for all races.3 Data as far back as 2009 show no significant change in the infant mortality rate for Black infants in Ohio.

Risk factors among 2020 infant deaths in Ohio revealed:

The effect of these high-risk health behaviors on future pregnancies and limited access to care urges the need to provide medical care for women of childbearing age during the interconception period.

Care2 focuses on the following areas:

  • Depression and Anxiety
  • Tobacco Use and Vaping
  • Family Planning and Multivitamin/Folic Acid Use
  • Infant safe Sleep

 

Clinical Experts Include:

  • Dr. Seuli Bose-Brill: Chief, the Ohio State University (OSU) Combined Internal Medicine/ Pediatrics Section; Director, OSU Maternal-Infant Dyad Practice; Associate Professor, Clinical, Department of Medicine, OSU College of Medicine. Dr. Brill’s passion is helping to care for healthy families by providing health care to moms and babies and ensuring that pregnancies are as healthy as possible. She specializes in treating complicated pregnancies and helping pregnant women with either pre-existing conditions or new disorders.
  • Dr. Amythest Gauthier: Assistant Professor, Department of Family and Community Medicine The Ohio State University, Wexner Medical Center. Dr. Gauthier specializes in general primary care and focuses on preventive medicine, mom and baby care, and managing chronic conditions.
  • Dr. Monique Katsuki: Obstetrician/Gynecologist, Cleveland Clinic Women’s Health Institute. Dr Katsuki is an OB/Gyn Hospitalist at the Cleveland Clinic and works with the Institute's Center for Infant & Maternal Health, where she works on programming and research to improve equity in maternal and infant outcomes and experiences with healthcare.

 


Resources:

Connect with our project-specific website at https://ohioaap.org/qi-programs-moc-iv/care2-two-generational-health


Sponsors:

Care 2 is sponsored by the Ohio Department of Medicaid (ODM), the Ohio Department of Health (ODH) and administered by the Ohio Colleges of Medicine Government Resource Center (GRC), in partnership with Ohio Chapter- American Academy of Pediatrics (OhioAAP).


Citations:

  1. Family Medicine Education Consortium. (2016). IMPLICIT Interconception Care Toolkit. Retrieved from https://www.marchofdimes.org/professionals/implicit-interconception-care-toolkit.aspx
  2. Ohio Department of Health. (2018). Ohio Infant Mortality Annual Report. Columbus.
  3. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, “Reproductive Health/Infant Mortality,” September 2020. [Online]. Available: https://www.cdc.gov/reproductivehealth/maternalinfanthealth/infantmortality.htm#:~:text=In%202018%2C%20the%20infant%20mortality,deaths%20per%201%2C000%20live%20births.
  4. Ohio Department of Health, Ohio Department of Medicaid, Ohio Colleges of Medicine Government Resource Center. (2020). Selected Findings from the 2018 Ohio Pregnancy Assessment Survey (OPAS).

Ohio Department of Health
Ohio Department of Medicaid logo
MedTAPP logo
GRC horizontal logo. Contains an image of Ohio's state in multicolored dots with 'Ohio Colleges of Medicine Government Resource Center'in text to the right.
The logo for the Ohio Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics