An Initiative to Improve Maternal Health

Focusing on Improving Maternal Health Outcomes

In 2019, the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) awarded the National Healthy Start Association (NHSA) with a cooperative agreement for a five-year project focused on improving maternal health outcomes across the United States. This program would become the Alliance for Innovation on Maternal Health Community Care Initiative (AIM CCI).

Goals of the Project

AIM CCI’s goal is to reduce maternal mortality and morbidity through the development and implementation of non-hospital focused maternal safety bundles across community and outpatient settings. These safety bundles are sets of evidence-based practices meant to improve maternal health outcomes. The bundles are created to address specific areas of need in communities that experience high rates of maternal mortality and morbidity.

By utilizing an equity framework at all stages, AIM CCI also seeks to reduce disparities in health outcomes based on race and ethnicity. Black and Native birthing persons are around three times more likely to die from pregnancy complications than white birthing persons. The root causes of these racial inequities in maternal health care must be uncovered and addressed.

(Source: https://www.cdc.gov/vitalsigns/maternal-deaths/index.html)

Why Focus on the Community?

The community and outpatient setting was deliberately chosen to help address systemic inequities in regions with poor health outcomes for pregnant and postpartum birthing persons. Community organizations know the birthing persons in their region best—they are in more frequent contact and communication with birthing persons no matter where they are on the pregnancy or postpartum continuum. They also understand the specific challenges women in their region face. If community organizations and traditional health care structures can connect and communicate, public health interventions can be tailored to meet the specific needs of birthing persons in a particular region and outcomes can be improved.