On Sept. 10, the Mississippi Division of Medicaid (DOM) was one of 13 states and one U.S. territory awarded a four-year grant to improve maternal and infant health outcomes in Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) populations from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS).
The Maternal and Infant Health Initiative is designed to support state efforts to increase the use of effective methods of contraception among all women in Medicaid and CHIP. Selected states will collect and report data for the development of a new contraceptive utilization measure. Funding from the grants comes from the Affordable Care Act. The CMS defined period of performance is four years; it began Sept. 16, 2015, and runs through Sept. 15, 2019.
The Mississippi State Department of Health reports that Mississippi’s infant mortality rate climbed to 9.7 percent in 2013. The number one cause of infant death in Mississippi is low birth weight and prematurity. With the help of this additional funding from CMS, the DOM Quality Improvement team will work with outside stakeholders to improve the health of Mississippi’s mothers and newborns.
Learn more about Maternal and Infant Health Care Quality on the CMS website.
