Montefiore Home Care will receive a $1.4 million grant from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to implement a maternal and early childhood health home-visit program. Working together, Montefiore Home Care and the Nurse-Family Partnership (NFP) will establish an evidence-based program in which nurses will visit eligible first-time mothers to improve pregnancy, child health, and development outcomes. The program is one of many Montefiore Health System efforts to promote community health and provide care where patients need it most, often beyond hospital walls.

The Montefiore/NFP program aims to support Medicaid or WIC-eligible moms who are facing obstacles to good health, including poverty, poor nutrition, unemployment, substance abuse, and unstable relationships. Montefiore selected NFP as its partner based on the health outcomes and overall improvements in maternal health, child health, and economic security that the nurse home-visiting program has delivered for families.

Montefiore Home Care’s successes in developing maternal and child health programs and its mission and history of helping hard-to-reach populations are well aligned with NFP’s home-visiting model. Montefiore Home Care has strong relationships with community-service organizations and other providers that will connect vulnerable mothers with additional support services during and after their participation in the program.

“Last year, Montefiore provided care for more than 2,000 births by first-time, low-income mothers, many of whom were 18 or younger. Montefiore NFP nurses will contact vulnerable families like these, visit them at home, and provide support and information to improve birth and child development outcomes. The program’s nurses will visit 100 first-time moms no later than 27 weeks of gestation until their child turns two. We are delighted to partner with NFP to improve the well-being of these families and support home-visiting programs,” said Pam Joachim, R.N., M.A., executive director, Montefiore Home Care.

Program nurses will conduct periodic home visits to low-income pregnant women with no previous live births, most of whom are unmarried or teenagers. Nurses will assess pregnant women’s health, social needs and economic standing. After the baby is born, home visitors monitor children’s health, development and growth, while also ensuring that moms are capable of caring for their child. Nurses encourage behavioral changes and provide recommendations for resources and services families can use throughout the program and for when the child ages out.

“We are excited to have the opportunity to work with NFP to offer low-income mothers nurse home-visiting services that have been proven to reduce child abuse, neglect and injuries,” said Angela Schonberg, M.P.T., assistant director, Business Development and Clinical Outreach, Montefiore Home Care, and administrator, Montefiore NFP Program. “This program will complement the array of maternal and child health programs that currently exist throughout Montefiore Health System.”

At present, HHS’s Maternal, Infant and Early Childhood Home Visiting (MIECHV) initiative includes 10 home visiting projects and serves more than 2,000 families a year. Montefiore was one of seven health providers that received funding from MIECHV and it is estimated that this latest round of grant funding will create seven new home visiting projects. It is MIECHV’s goal to serve an additional 700 families a year over approximately two years.

Montefiore Home Care is dedicated to providing patients with supportive healthcare at home, serving 3,000 patients every day. Established in 1947, Montefiore Home Care is the nation’s first hospital-based agency that helps people from birth to end of life get access to a range of highly trained clinicians, services and programs.