Maternal Contact With Child Protective Services Associated With Less Postpartum Care In Wisconsin, 2010-19.

Area of Science:

• Public Health
• Social Work
• Health Services Research

Background:

• Maternal involvement with Child Protective Services (CPS) is frequent around childbirth, especially for mothers facing economic and health difficulties.
• Existing policies aim to enhance healthcare access for CPS-involved families, but empirical evidence on the impact of CPS contact on maternal healthcare utilization is limited.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the association between Child Protective Services (CPS) involvement and the receipt of postpartum health care among mothers in Wisconsin.
• To provide evidence for improving healthcare access and utilization for CPS-involved families.

Main Methods:

• Utilized linked, population-based administrative data from all Medicaid-covered births in Wisconsin (2010-2019).
• Employed statistical methods to estimate the association between CPS interventions and maternal postpartum care receipt, adjusting for confounding factors.
• Analyzed data across different levels of CPS intervention and key population subgroups.

Main Results:

• Women whose births came to the attention of CPS were approximately 13 percentage points less likely to receive postpartum care within 12 weeks of delivery.
• This negative association persisted across various levels of CPS intervention and significant population subgroups.
• The findings indicate a consistent pattern of reduced postpartum care utilization among mothers with CPS involvement.

Conclusions:

• CPS involvement is associated with a significant reduction in timely postpartum healthcare for new mothers.
• There is a critical need to align child welfare and healthcare policies and practices to improve healthcare connections for mothers and infants involved with CPS.
• Interventions should focus on supporting continuity of care for vulnerable maternal populations interacting with the child welfare system.