III.E.2.b.iii.a. MCH Epidemiology Workforce

The Maternal & Child Health Epidemiology Team is recognized as an integral part of the MCH division and works closely with MCH colleagues in data-driven decision-making, planning and programmatic support, enhancing reports and outreach with data visualizations, increasing access to data for partners, and fulfilling data requests to promote MCH’s work and mission.

The MCH Epidemiology Team is led by the MCH Epidemiology Director and consists of a Perinatal Epidemiology Lead, Infant Mortality Epidemiologist, Surveillance Epidemiologist, Home Visiting Epidemiologist, My Healthy Baby Evaluator, and My Healthy Baby Data Coordinator. The MCH Epidemiology Director reports directly to the MCH Director and the team is physically located within the division. The team supports data needs from colleagues within the division, supplies necessary data and analyses for grants and key performance indicators, and responds to requests from external stakeholders and oftentimes from the executive staff directly. They also support requests from the Indiana Perinatal Quality Improvement Collaborative (IPQIC) and provide a wide range of data support to IPQIC task force working groups.

The MCH Epidemiology Team works closely with the agency’s Office of Data & Analytics (ODA), Fatality Review and Prevention Division, the Vital Records Division, and other division epidemiologists throughout the agency. The MCH Epi Team maintains robust skillsets in advanced analyses, data visualizations, dashboard creation, and data linkages and modeling. The MCH division has come to rely on data presentations and fact sheets that are created and maintained by the MCH Epi Team to help tell the story of need and disparate health outcomes across Indiana within the MCH population.

The MCH Epidemiology Team is also a key partner and contributor to several public-facing data dashboards that allow users to access and utilize data as they need it, instead of having to request static data requests. This has included providing frequent data analyses and reports for the agency’s publicly available dashboard, Stats Explorer, which displays content on a variety of topics including preterm births, prenatal care, breastfeeding, and infant mortality, and providing data for the Governor’s Equity Portal, which highlights the need for health equity in Indiana.

The MCH Epidemiology Team continues to evolve and has grown to include a state-funded data coordinator. This new position was created to assist with the standardization of the data collected through our state’s My Healthy Baby project. As My Healthy Baby has become a state-wide initiative to connect pregnant people to services earlier on in their pregnancies, the need to assess this work has increased. Because home visiting programs across the state vary greatly, the Epi Team was tasked with establishing a methodology for aggregating home visiting metrics in a meaningful way. The My Healthy Baby Data Coordinator reviews home visiting data collection systems and documentation and works with the My Healthy Baby Evaluator to develop a plan for this evaluation process.

In the future, the MCH Epi Team hopes to add a Fetal Death Epidemiologist to our team so that they have the ability to analyze Vital Records’ fetal death data and gain a much stronger understanding of this important topic, which can help inform MCH programming and decision-making.

Staffing includes:

• Haley Hannant started in her role as the MCH Epidemiology Director in March but has been working on the MCH Epi team for about four years. Haley has her Master of Public Health in Quantitative Methods, with a strong background in biostatistics, and is ultimately responsible for the data products from the Epi Team. She receives data requests on behalf of the MCH division and reviews and disseminates them to the appropriate epidemiologists, ensuring that data are provided in a timely and secure manner. Haley is skilled in SAS and Tableau. She is funded partly by Title V and partly funded by a state fund.
• Camille Singh: MCH’s Perinatal Epidemiology Lead. This position is responsible for data related to perinatal health and supporting advanced statistical projects. This position reports to the Epi Director and leads data analyses related to natality and infant mortality data. They supervise the Infant Mortality Epidemiologist and ensure that any data needs related to perinatal or infant health are done in a timely manner and with excellence. They serve as the agency’s subject matter expert on birth and death record data. This position produces the bulk of the department’s birth outcomes analyses. They work very closely with the agency’s Data Analysis Team and the Vital Records Division to ensure that the birth and death data sources we are using to inform much of our Title V work is high-quality. This position will be solely funded by Title V.
• VACANT: The MCH Infant Mortality Epidemiologist and is responsible for data requests and products related to infant mortality and natality. She produces yearly data fact sheets, slide decks, and trend analyses. Camille works hard to support IPQIC data needs and task force requests, including perinatal levels of care, maternal transport, perinatal substance use, cause of death analyses, and other ad hoc requests. She has her Master of Public Health in Epidemiology. She is funded partly by Title V and partly funded by a state fund.
• Yordanos Gebru is the My Healthy Baby Evaluator. Yordi is responsible for the data analysis, monitoring, and key performance indicators related to the My Healthy Baby project. She works with real-time data, oversees data cleaning and finalization, and has worked to streamline dataflows utilizing Tableau dashboards. She has her Master of Public Health and is proficient in Tableau. She is solely funded through state dollars.
• Harmoni El-Amin is the My Healthy Baby Data Coordinator. Harmoni is responsible for enhancing data access for the My Healthy Baby program through data exploration, documentation, and standardization. She helps maintain key relationships with home visiting partners and works to understand the various data systems, collection methods, and forms of data storage. She is funded solely through state dollars.
• Dan Phan is the MCH Surveillance Epidemiologist and is responsible for survey support and data analysis of the Pregnancy Risk Assessment Monitoring System (PRAMS). He also provides data and workflow support to other MCH surveillance projects, including the Youth Risk Behavior Survey (YRBS) and School Health Profiles (SHP). Dan ensures that MCH meets all CDC requirements for PRAMS sampling and has worked directly with the state’s survey vendor to provide vital records data for survey administration. Dan works closely with the MCH Programs team to produce new analyses and fulfill data requests. He is currently working to analyze ESSENCE data related to youth suicide attempts. He supports the team’s perinatal substance use work through his skill with REDCap. He is fully funded through Title V.
• Getachew Tegegne is the Home Visiting Epidemiologist. He is responsible for the data analyses and products related to Indiana’s investment in home visiting. The major focus is on analyzing MIECHV funded programming from Nurse Family Partnership (NFP) and supplying comprehensive analyses for quarterly data quality reviews. He has been providing data support as our MCH staff works through the statewide expansion of NFP. This position is fully funded through Title V.