Other MCH Data Capacity Efforts
As mentioned above, the peer group style of the Division of Population Health Data (DPHD) and cross-office and agency collaborations allows the MCH Epidemiology Unit to access data and information systems to support MCH epidemiological activities.
The DPHD maintains multiple public-facing dashboards that provide data on common indicators at the state, region, district and locality level. These dashboards include MCH, Health Behavior, Injury and Violence, Cancer, CYSHCN and Sickle Cell.
The Virginia Pregnancy Risk Assessment Monitoring Systems (VA PRAMS), Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS), Virginia Youth Survey (Youth Risk Behavior Survey), and the Virginia Cancer Registry (VCR) are housed within the DPHD. DPHD epidemiologists, including the MCH Epidemiology Unit, actively participate on steering committees regarding these sources and collaborate for access and analysis. In addition, the MCH Epidemiologist Lead implemented a cross-unit journal club within DPHD to discuss papers and methods, and encourage collaboration across epidemiology units by facilitating new projects using existing data sources and identifying research gaps. The DPHD also has discussions to update health surveys, as necessary. For example, Virginia legalized marijuana in the state as of July 1, 2021, and our population health surveys made provisions to add marijuana-related supplements/questions to the surveys, with PRAMS starting the marijuana supplement in October 2021 and BRFSS in 2022.
Virginia House Bill 2111 (2021) established the Maternal Health Data and Quality Measures Task Force for the purpose of evaluating maternal health data collection to guide policies in the Commonwealth to improve maternal care, quality, and outcomes for all birthing people in the Commonwealth. The provisions of the bill require the Task Force to monitor and evaluate relevant stakeholder data related to race, ethnicity, demographic and clinical outcomes to examine quality of care. The first Task Force meeting launched in March 2022. The MCH Epidemiologist Lead serves as a subject matter expert/member on this Task Force, and the DPHD Director serves as an ex officio member.
Unite Us: Unite Virginia is a coordinated care network of health and social care providers. Partners in the network are connected through a shared technology platform, Unite Us, which enables them to send and receive electronic referrals, address people’s social needs, and improve health across communities. Unite Virginia is built in partnership with the Office of the Virginia Secretary of Health and Human Resources, the Virginia Department of Health and the Virginia Department of Social Services, Optima Health, Virginia Hospital & Healthcare Association, Partnering for a Healthy Virginia, and Kaiser Permanente. The actions taken in the Unite Us platform generate data about referral outcomes and population characteristics.
VHHA Maternal Health Dashboard: VDH and the Virginia Neonatal Perinatal Collaborative (VNPC) partnered to provide all birthing hospitals in Virginia access to the Maternal Health Outcomes Dashboard Analytics platform created by the Virginia Hospital & Healthcare Association (VHHA). The Maternal Health Outcomes Dashboard provides a comprehensive look at factors that drive maternal health outcomes, allowing the ability to investigate/visualize birth outcomes, severe maternal morbidities (SMM), chronic disease, and more stratified by race, zip code, payer type, and social determinants of health.
Fatality Review: As the Maternal Mortality Review Team (MMRT) and Child Fatality Review Team (CFRT) are housed under the Division of Death Prevention in the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner (OCME), DPHD maintains a relationship for data sharing and expanded data capacity related to maternal and child mortality and health disparities. Data come from the Maternal Mortality Surveillance Program and Child Fatality Surveillance Program, and include expanded information on precipitants of and circumstances surrounding the death, demographics, and social determinants of health.
Virginia House Bill 1950 (2021) directed the OCME to convene a work group to assess the feasibility of implementing the Fetal Infant Mortality Review Team (FIMRT), in which the Director of Child and Family Health served as a member. Implementation of the FIMRT has the potential to expand data capacity related to fetal deaths, and although a report was published with the findings and recommendations from this work group, a bill was not submitted in the most recent legislative cycle to allow for its implementation at this time.
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