Pathways community care coordination in low birth weight prevention

Area of Science:

• Public Health
• Maternal and Child Health
• Health Services Research

Background:

• Limited evidence exists on home visiting care coordination's effectiveness for poor birth outcomes like low birth weight (LBW).
• The Community Health Access Project (CHAP) employs community health workers (CHWs) to identify at-risk pregnant women, connect them to services, and ensure issue resolution.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate the impact of the CHAP Pathways program on reducing low birth weight (LBW) in an urban Ohio community.

Main Methods:

• A quasi-experimental design matched 115 CHAP clients (intervention group) with 115 non-CHAP births (control group) using propensity scores from birth certificate data.
• Logistic regression analysis was employed to assess the association between CHAP participation and LBW, controlling for known risk factors.

Main Results:

• The intervention group (CHAP clients) had a significantly lower rate of LBW (6.1%) compared to the control group (13.0%).
• The adjusted odds ratio for LBW among CHAP clients was 0.35 (95% CI: 0.12-0.96), indicating a protective effect.

Conclusions:

• Structured community care coordination, exemplified by the CHAP Pathways program, demonstrates potential in reducing low birth weight among high-risk populations.
• The model's success is attributed to systematic tracking of needs and outcome-based payment for community health workers (CHWs).