Sara Nelis Presents at National Safer Childbirth Cities Conference

On August 23 and 24, the Association of Maternal & Child Health Programs hosted the Safer Childbirth Cities (SCC) annual meeting in Chicago with presentations being shared by large and small organizations across the country, including Pittsburgh's program facilitated by the Jewish Healthcare Foundation and the Women's Health Activist Movement Global (WHAMglobal).

Safer Childbirth Cities was launched in 2018 as an initiative of Merck for Mothers, Merck's $500 million global initiative to help create a world where no woman has to die while giving life. The multi-year effort aims to foster community-led solutions that will help cities become safer, more equitable places to give birth. JHF and WHAMglobal partner with seven organizations across the region whose programs fill gaps and provide crucial services to the Pittsburgh community.

At the conference Sara Nelis, RN, project manager for the Pennsylvania Perinatal Quality Collaborative (PA PQC) and the Pittsburgh: A Safer Childbirth City initiative, shared the homerun model created by JHF's Founder and CEO Karen Wolk Feinstein, PhD, to measure progress on sustained change within organizations.

The homerun model outlines success in effecting change as: First base, establishing a vision, theory of change partners and action plan; second base, putting that plan into action, testing theories and measuring progress; third base, recruitment and targeted communication; and a homerun as widespread recognition and sustained change. A grand slam is when policy change results.

Other presentations included: Alliance for Innovation on Maternal Health – Community Care Initiative on how community-based organizations and community healthcare workers can implement AIM/ACOG maternal safety bundles outside of the hospital setting; National Birth Equity Collaborative presented the data dictionary they created to assist Safer Childbirth City teams with collecting and analyzing data metrics; HealthConnect One shared their model for sustainable community birth worker training; SisterWeb shared their community doula framework that includes paying and fully benefitting their doulas while still keeping their services free for Black, Pacific Islander and Latinx patients and collaborating with each of the birthing sites in their county.