PRIORITY: Information is available to support informed health decisions and choices

 

SPM 4: Percent of adults who report that it is somewhat difficult or very difficult to understand information that doctors, nurses and other health professionals tell them.

 

 

Objective: Increase the proportion of MCH grantees that provide health information education to clients to improve health decision making among women, pregnant women, children, adolescents, and children and youth with special health care needs annually.

 

SHCN Care Coordination: The KS-SHCN Care Coordinators have continued to assist clients/families in making informed health decisions by assisting them in learning about their options, make informed decisions, and assisting in problem solving solutions. All information, written or oral, is presented to families with the health literacy of the family in mind. All KS-SHCN Care Coordinators are encouraged to participant in health literacy trainings. During care coordination training, health literacy is discussed, and all coordinators participate in role playing activities to help them identify the families/client’s literacy abilities and modify their assistance, so the families/clients’ needs are properly being addressed. The Care Coordinators will continue to provide training and support to clients/families to equip and empower them to be able to make health decisions independently.

 

Navigating Kansas Medicaid and the Insurance System: Local MCH agencies will continue to assist their clients in navigating the insurance system and/or Kansas Medicaid. Local agencies will continue to facilitate the on-site enrollment of MCH clients into insurance and Kansas Medicaid. All agencies will screen clients for insurance status at every visit encounter. If the client does not have insurance, clients are also screened for Medicaid income eligibility. If the client meets Medicaid income guidelines, applications will be given to clients and assistance offered in completing the application and submitting it to Medicaid. For clients who do not qualify for Medicaid, Marketplace health insurance information will be provided along with contact information to a Navigation Specialist.

 

Research shows that individuals with low health literacy are less likely to engage in health care (preventative and sick visits), often misread prescription labels, have increased visits to the Emergency Room and have Higher Mortality rates. Kansas MCH recognizes the importance of promoting health literacy, especially in our primary high-risk population. Many of the training resources listed above and in the other domain report sections, such as the integration tool kits (well woman visit, reproductive life plan, oral health, smoking, mental health) One Key Question®, Count the Kicks®, Safe Sleep training programs, Community Baby Showers, breastfeeding, Cuddle books, etc. are all a means to help local MCH agencies provide health education to clients to improve decision making about their health. This will remain a priority for Title V in the upcoming year as the primary responsibility for health literacy lies with public health professionals and the health care and public health systems.

 

Teen Pregnancy Targeted Case Management (TPTCM) and Pregnancy Maintenance Initiative (PMI): All TPTCM & PMI awardees will continue to incorporate parenting education as a fundamental part of their service model. Educational material will be presented individually through one-on-one sessions and in group settings when appropriate to facilitate peer support networks. Fathers will be encouraged to participate in activities alongside the mother when appropriate to increase knowledge, skills and resources.

 

Local MCH Agencies: A key component of local MCH agency work is education. All local agencies are providing education as part of MCH visit for all MCH populations. The DAISEY shared measurement system captures what type(s) of education are provided during each visit at the local level through the “MCH Service Form” (see screenshot, types of education outlined in red). Data is reviewed regularly to ensure alignment with local proposals and budgets tied to advancing the state action plan priorities/measures.

 

 

Objective: Increase youth-focused and youth-driven initiatives to support successful transition, self-determination, and advocacy by 2020.

 

Kansas Youth Empowerment Academy: The KS-SHCN program will continue to provide funding support for the Kansas Youth Empowerment Academy (KYEA) Faces of Change program for youth in Kansas. This program builds strong leadership skills for youth with disabilities. KS-SHCN has been providing Aid-to-Local grant funding for this program since 2016 and has seen tremendous value in the work the FACES staff are doing in increasing and improving youth’s self-perception of themselves, ability to understand their disability, self-advocacy, becoming active community participants through their community projects and improving their overall leadership skills. Many of these youth return in subsequent sessions to help teach the new co-hort. This is a seven-month intensive program that for the first time in the program’s history, will be opened for both youth with and without disabilities to participate in. The SHCN Program Manager will participate in at least one, FACES session to get to know the participants, learn about their community projects, become familiar with the work occurring, and answer question about the KS-SHCN program.

 

Care Coordination: The KS-SHCN program understand and values the importance of quality transition and has built it into the Care Coordination activities. Families will continue to be encouraged to start think about transition early in a child’s life. Care Coordinators will continue to request that youth, 14 years or older, participate in the development of their Action Plan. Care Coordinators will continue to assist both the parents and youth with transition preparation and activities as appropriate to meet their individual needs. Over the next year, more KS-SHCN staff time will be devoted to reviewing and improving transition services by reviewing currently policies, protocols, materials and building a stronger collaborative partnership with the MCH Child & Adolescent Health Consultant and youth organizations such as the KYEA.     

 

 Objective: Incorporate information regarding changes to the health care system into existing trainings and technical assistance by 2020.

 

Special Health Care Needs: The KS-SHCN program will continue to build infrastructure and capacity to increase services for all children with SHCN in Kansas. KS-SHCN will continue to align program services and contractual supports with the “Standards for System of Care for Children and Youth with Special Health Care Needs.” A state plan was developed as part of a D-70 grant opportunity that will be used for future program improvements and initiatives. The program understands that these standards lay the ground work in improving the systems of care for the CYSHCN population and will continue to use them as the frame work as services and supports are changed, improved or added.

 

Local MCH Agencies: Title V staff will provide support for the 2020 Annual Governor’s Public Health Conference which will include an MCH pre-conference that will focus on current and emerging MCH issues. State MCH staff will continue to provide technical assistance and training to all local MCH agencies by way of technical assistance calls and webinar and on-site visits. It is the role of the state health department to guide local agencies in moving MCH work ahead in their communities. When local agencies find a gap in services in their communities or come across a barrier that they need help navigating around state MCH staff is there to assist them with facilitation, coordination and innovative thinking.

 

Objective: Increase opportunities to empower families and build strong MCH advocates by 2020.
 

Supporting You Kansas – Peer to Peer Support Network: The KS-SHCN program is one of three programs in the Supporting You peer to peer network system. This system is a peer to peer network that links a peer looking for emotional support and informal resources with another peer who has had a similar life experience. The network/platform was launched in December of 2018 and the search began for Supporting Peers (those providing support to others). Once there are enough trained Supporting Peers in the system, it will be opened for Connect Peers (those seeking support) to enroll. This is expected to occur in the summer of 2019.

 

During FY 2020, all SHCN staff will assist with recruiting Supporting Peers and offering this program to those who would like to be matched. Promotional fliers will be distributed across the state at various conference, health fairs, and a variety of other events. Training webinars will be conducted the third Tuesday of every month at noon and 7:00 pm to provide training to those who sign up to be a Supporting Peers. The Peer Support Administrator (PSA) will match Connected Peers with Supporting Peers and monitor all peer matches for fidelity. The PSA will be there throughout the match to provide ongoing support for both Supporting and Connected Peers. Additional trainings will be developed as identified for Supporting Peers. It is hoped that these trainings will also be available within the data system sometime within 2020. It is expected that enhancements to the data system will also occur as the program expands.

 

Other Cross-Cutting Activities

 

Shared Measurement Systems in MCH – DAISEY ((https://kdhe.daiseysolutions.org/): Title V’s vision for integrated and coordinated community-level maternal and child health initiatives requires high quality, reliable data from all local MCH providers across the state. We are intently focused on measuring what matters. Kansas MCH uses DAISEY to collect data from local agencies providing services for Title V MCH, Title X Family Planning, Healthy Start (through June 2019), MIECHV, and LYFTE. DAISEY is also the data collection and reporting system for the KPQC Neonatal Abstinence Syndrome initiative. Hospitals capture timely information for reporting related to the process measures. At the time of application, there were 1,126 total users representing 158 unique organizations. Title V and KU-CPPR Staff will continue to provide extensive training and technical assistance for DAISEY users via webinars, individual phone instruction, on-site training and recorded navigational videos.

 

In an effort to support MCH local agencies with utilizing data in meaningful ways, the Priority Populations Report was developed and released March 2019. The report aggregates and compares demographic data as captured on the KDHE Program Visit Form (Adult and Child). The purpose of the report is to allow DAISEY users (MCH local agencies/workforce) to assess information about the communities they serve, across all of the KDHE programs they administer. The report contains 4 dashboards – 2 for caregivers and 2 for children, one of which displays any one user-selected demographic dimension (for example, employment status), and the other which allows users to compare any two demographic dimensions they select (for example, employment status by race). On both Caregiver Dashboard 2 and Child Dashboard 2, users can select any two demographic data points collected on either the Profile form or Program Visit form to view a comparison across those dimensions – for example, Child ethnicity by Child race.

 

 

In October of 2018 Title V partnered with KU-CPPR to host our first ever DAISEY Learning Collaborative. Plans are in place to bring the DAISEY Learning Collaborative back for FY20. For this innovative project, we worked with three local MCH agencies to collaborate and explore ways to impact their programs and practices with DAISEY data. Each of the three agencies was awarded a mini grant of $1,000 to support time on the project. With expert technical assistance and support from Title V as well as the KU DAISEY team, each agency used their local DAISEY data to identify an area of opportunity for improvement within their practice. They implemented a Plan-Do-Study-Act (PDSA) cycle/s to make small-scale changes and then used DAISEY data to measure the impact. This project kicked off with an in-person live event in which grantees worked together with Title V and DAISEY staff to identify their project. Three technical assistance webinars were held to help the teams along the way. The project ended with a wrap-up session in which teams summarized their project and impact. The teams presented what they learned and challenges they had to their peers at the 2018 Governor’s Public Health Conference. Title V plans to host cohort two of the DAISEY Learning Collaborative in FY20. Requests for applications will be released in September 2019 for a project start date of October 2019. Cohort two project will run until April 2020 and wrap with the participating teams presenting summaries of their projects at the 2020 Governor’s Public Health Conference. This encourages utilization and application of MCH data at the local level.

 

Continuous quality improvement is a top priority of Title V. We will continue to gain feedback from local MCH agencies through our DAISEY Advisory Board that will inform emerging issues that need to be address in DAISESY as well as what upgrades and changes to current forms is needed. A lot of work will continue to be done internally related to “deep dives” into the data, evaluating progress and needs of MCH partners based on DAISEY data, and determining the impact of services. For example, we will be assessing if individuals screened were referred for services educated on topics related to needs identified through screening. DAISEY houses more than 45,000 caregiver profiles and nearly 27,000 child profiles.

 

MCH Health (Equity) Opportunity Project: Health equity means that everyone has a fair and just opportunity to be healthy. Health equity work requires identifying and removing obstacles to health such as lack of access to good jobs, quality education, safe housing and environments, fresh food, health care and more. Creating health equity is a guiding priority and a core value of public health. In order to advance equity in MCH, Title V is innovating with the University of Kansas Center for Community Health & Development (KU-CCHD) to implement the first-ever Maternal and Child Health Opportunity Project (MCHOP).

 

The MCHOP is intended to support local community efforts to assure equal opportunities to health for all Kansas mothers, children, and their families. A request for applications was released in May 2019 and several applications were received. The application provided guidance and an opportunity for agencies to describe how their organization and partners will work to advance local efforts to assure equal opportunities for maternal and child health populations regardless of income, education, age, race/ethnicity, or where people live. Title V plans to work with seven local MCH agencies with awards of up to $10,000 each. Review of applications began in June 2019 and implementation is scheduled through April 2020.

 

The Kansas Healthy Communities Action Toolkit was developed as a resource for participating agencies to offer guidance for taking action to build communities with equal opportunities for healthy living and well-being. The toolkit provides questions to consider, recommended actions, and examples (resources and links to tools) to support filling out the application as well as learning about action in community work. Kansas Title V and KU-CCHD will offer guidance and technical assistance throughout this project.

 

Screenshot of Healthy Communities Action Toolkit (https://ksactiontoolkit.org)

 

 

 

PRIORITY: Professionals have the knowledge and skills to address the needs of maternal and child health populations

 

SPM 5: Number of MCH grantees, families, and partners that participated in a state sponsored workforce development event.

 

 

Objective: Build MCH capacity and support the development of a trained, qualified workforce by providing professional development events at least four times each year through 2020.

 

Local MCH Network of Agencies: Title V plans to contract with nearly 70 local agencies during FY20 to provide MCH services across the population domains. The majority of local programs funded by the Block Grant are delivered by local health departments and safety net clinics (independent entities). These agencies are positioned to provide core public health services in addition to MCH, so the delivery system has the advantages of convenience and comprehensive care. The services delivered by local agencies are designed to address ongoing needs and those identified by the most recent needs assessment. A map displaying reach is included below, based on FY20 recommendations.

 

 

The MCH Navigator and online MCH Assessment are utilized and fully integrated into the professional development planning and performance reviews for all staff. All MCH program staff and supervisors must complete MCH training via the online MCH Navigator. Two courses must be completed within three months of grant award or hire, whichever applies (MCH 101 and MCH Orientation). In addition to basic training and orientation, local program staff delivering certain messages or services, including education, are required to complete training (e.g., tobacco, breastfeeding, safe sleep, care coordination, etc.). Annual/ongoing training requirements for all local MCH staff include Technical Assistance Calls/Webinars throughout the year led by the state MCH team and the annual Governor’s Public Health Conference. Other courses selected for professional development must be identified on the “personalized learning plan” as a result of completing the online MCH Navigator Self-Assessment.

 

During Fall 2019, for the first time MCH program staff will provide an opportunity for grantees across programs to connect and network. The agenda will include an opportunity to review regional and county data, share successes, and discuss challenges collaboratively with regional peers. Additionally, grantees will be able to schedule one-on-one meetings with their agency program contacts to discuss individual technical assistance needs.

Special Health Care Needs (SHCN) Care Coordination: The KS-SHCN Care Coordinators have continued to assist clients/families in making informed health decisions by assisting them in learning about their options, make informed decisions, and assist in problem solving solutions. All information, written or oral, was presented to families with the health literacy of the family in mind. All KS-SHCN Care Coordinators were encouraged to participant in health literacy trainings. During care coordination training, health literacy was discussed, and all coordinators participated in role playing activities to help them identify the families/client’s literacy abilities and modify their assistance, so the families/clients’ needs are properly being addressed. The Care Coordinators will continue to provide training and support to clients/families to equip and empower them to be able to make health decisions independently.
 

Local Public Health Program (LPHP) Partnership: Kansas Title V will continue to partner with the LPHP to provide professional development events to the MCH network. In the coming year the LPHP will provide the following activities:

• Continue, launch, and/or expand efforts focused on health equity, adverse childhood experiences, and implementing trauma informed systems of care at KDHE as well as with local health departments
• Produce and disseminate MCH articles, news, resources and training opportunities through the Public Health Connections electronic newsletter
• Link MCH priorities to the Foundational Services
• Provide sessions related to cross cutting/life course issues at the Governor’s Public Health Conference, Regional Public Health meetings and other venues
• Conduct monthly population health webinars for local health department staff and other public health system partners
• Plan and deliver of the 2020 Governor’s Public Health Conference to meet the workforce needs of Kansas local health departments, including MCH workforce
• Plan with Title V to address workforce needs for well woman visits and reproductive life plans
• Facilitate regional public health meetings and other events for local public health administrators as an avenue for providing workforce development—future regional public health meetings will include a variety of topics including:
  • A presentation from MCH leadership
  • An update on the Immunization Program
  • A presentation from the Division of Health Care Finance on Medicaid billing and Medicaid updates
  • Sharing updates from KDHE as a result of what was learned from the listening tour

• Organize live KanBeHealthy (EPSDT) trainings for health department staff and explore options for an online opportunity
• Continue collaboration with Kansas Public Health Workforce Development Coordinating Council
• Develop and provide quality improvement training for KDHE staff and local health departments

 

One Key Question® (OKQ): As discussed in the Women/Maternal Report, Title V brought The Power to Decide to Kansas this year to train local MCH, Family Planning, and other community providers on the pregnancy intention screening initiative, OKQ. In 2020, Title V will bring The Power to Decide back to Kansas for training cohort two. The plan for training cohort two is to target staff from Federally Qualified Health Centers, Rural Health Clinics, and other safety net clinics to scale and spread OKQ.

 

Integration Toolkit Training Webinars: As discussed in the relevant domain reports, Title V has developed or is developing several integration toolkits that focus on MCH priority work such as breastfeeding, safe sleep, oral health, well-woman visits, reproductive life plans, smoking, substance use, and mental health. All of these toolkits will include a live recorded training webinar as one of the available resources. This allows staff to re-watch the training webinar for a refresher or train newly hired staff on the contents and purpose of the toolkits.

 

LARC Grand Rounds: As discussed in the Women/Maternal Report, MCH and Family Planning and other state partners are planning a full day training event all about Long Acting Reversible Contraceptives (LARC). This one-day event will include education on billing and coding for LARC, clinical indications and myths, expert panel discussions and hands on insertion training. Kansas MCH plans to keep the energy going around LARC throughout the next year by hosting lunch and learn events based on the top ten questions surrounding LARC as well as continuing to market the LARC tool kit and offer technical assistance to communities that want to offer LARC but have barriers to service.

 

Objective: Deliver annual training and education to ensure that providers have the ability to promote diversity, inclusion, and integrate supports in the provision of services for the Special Health Care Needs (SHCN) population into adulthood.

 

The Title V program will continue to work on strategies related to offering information and training to child care and early education providers to support inclusion within those settings and assure higher quality care for CYSHCN. Activities include hosting webinars and online trainings for health providers on caring for CYSHCN, adapted from the Caring for People with Disabilities course, and partnering with the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) to offer youth and adult education programs to KS-SHCN clients. See the CSHCN Plan Section for more information on training and education for providers related to providing services for the CSHCN population.

 

Special Health Services Family Advisory Council (SHS-FAC): The SHS-FAC will continue to be involved at all levels of the KS-SHCN program. Without their guidance, assistance and input, the program staff would have no way of determining if the program is truly meeting to needs of the CYSHCN population. This group of family members have lived experiences that they openly share, to help the program grow to best meet the needs of CYSHCN. Their vision and direction drove the KS-SHCN Action Plan and will continue to hold program staff accountable for the fidelity of the plan. They will continue to assist with projects, be consulted for guidance on program implementation/changes and be active participants the new five-year needs assessment. Read more about the SHS-FAC in the Family Partnership section.

 

Partnership with Midwives: Among KDHE’s efforts to increase the knowledge and skills of professionals to address the needs of the maternal and child health populations, intentional workforce development activities are planned to target midwives. In an effort to engage this provider group, tremendous work has taken place since the later part of 2017 to develop the first annual Midwife Symposiums held July 10, 2019, in Wichita and August 7, 2019, in Overland Park. Through joint efforts between KDHE and the Kansas Midwife Association there is a full agenda for each day focused on educating midwives on Kansas MCH work and inform them what role midwives can play in Title V. MCH Consultant Stephanie Wolf will present on the Kansas Perinatal Community Collaboratives model, outcomes, and opportunities for partnership in their community. The symposium will also feature Juliet Swedlund, Doula and MCH Council member.

 

Objective: Increase the number of providers with capacity to provide mental health services/supports and trauma-informed care by 2020.

 

Trauma-Informed Care (TIC) & Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs): Kansas Title V generally works to frame activities and efforts in a comprehensive way vs. focusing on topics or singular issues. Therefore, many activities that relate to mental health, specifically TIC and ACEs, may not always be labeled as such. We are consistently focusing on positive, healthy relationships and environments for children and youth-positive experienc­es have a lasting impact on development, well-being and functioning. Infusing hope and resilience in all we do (optimism and strengths-based perspective) is an important part of our work, although we are aware of and understand the importance of considering well-documented impacts of toxic environments.

 

Lemonade for Life: Title V has been learning more about ACEs prevention and intervention in practice. A promising approach developed by the University of Kansas Center for Public Partnerships & Research that’s been implemented in Kansas and other states is Lemonade for Life (LFL). According to the website, LFL trains professionals working with parents and caregivers on use of the ACEs Questionnaire. The goal of is to prevent future exposure to ACEs while promoting resiliency and hope. The program helps individuals understand how early life experiences may have long-lasting effects on how they interact in relationships. The LFL training conveys that individuals cannot rewrite the beginning of their story, but they can change how it ends. It is not victim blaming, but rather instills hope and responsibility for change with the individual and is a key stepping stone for self-sufficiency. Title V recognizes the importance of educating public health professionals on ACEs as well as hope and resiliency. In FY20, Title V plans to host LFL training MCH Universal Home Visitors, and available space will be offered to partners in their communities. In addition, Title V plans to invest in a pilot community to participate in a LFL learning collaborative based on an Oklahoma model and positive outcomes when delivered through home visiting. This pilot will allow Title V to assess and measure the impact prior to integrating LFL into more MCH communities. The requirements for a community to participate include:

• Complete two online ACEs learning modules
• Attend a full day in-person training
• Attend at least one group coaching call approximately 45-60 days after training
• Participate in evaluation of Lemonade for Life Curriculum
• Commit to showing the Brain Builder video during the first three months, before the sixth visit to all prenatal clients and clients with children birth to 3 (scripted conversation provided)
• Commit to introducing ACEs Questionnaire after video has been watched
• Download video to Home Visitor cell phone or device and allow parents to hold the phone or device at the home visit while watching the video
• Introduce a discussion about parenting and the parent’s experience as a child, ACEs, stress/toxic stress, and how trauma can affect parenting (scripted conversation provided)
• Serve and return as a way to discuss the importance of interactions and building pathways in the brain especially reading and talking with baby
• Use YouTube videos of parents interacting with their babies as a closing for the visit

• Collect data on training, ACEs Questionnaire, referrals, parental motivation, and more

 

Family-Centered Care Focus: The Special Health Services Family Advisory Council (SHS-FAC) developed a one-page information sheet on trauma-informed care/approaches to help educate providers about this important topic (see image below). During the next year, this information sheet will continue to be shared with a wide variety of providers (medical, educational and community) at various conference across the state. Trauma informed care is an ongoing area of interest for the KS-SHCN program, including providing additional trainings and resources to the Satellite Offices and Aid to Local grantees over the next year.

 

 

Mental Health First Aid (MHFA): The MCH program will continue to be involved in ongoing discussions related to increasing access to mental health first aid and youth mental health first aid training through promotion and support. MHFA has already been provided to MCH home visitors across the state (and their partners—see what they said about the training below), but plans are underway to expand reach to school personnel, teachers, nurses, other MCH local agency staff (beyond home visitors), and any other community level partners interfacing with and/or providing services for adolescents.

 

Plans involve promoting mental health initiatives at the state and local levels, distribution of resources via counselors and MCH local agency listservs and updating websites and social media sites with relevant resources and information, including professional development/training opportunities. The Title V program has promoted MHFA on the Kansas MCH website and Facebook pages. The MCH website has a number of resources related to trauma-informed care and resilience available for use by local agencies and communities. http://www.kansasmch.org/aces.asp.

 

Objective: Implement collaborative oral health initiatives to expand oral health screening, education and referral by 2020.

 

Partnership with Oral Health Kansas: Title V will continue a formal agreement/partnership with Oral Health Kansas (read more in the Cross-cutting Report) in 2019 and 2020 to:

• Support work to expand oral health screenings in public health settings (WIC, SHCN, MCH)
  • Integrate oral health into the Kansas Help Me Grow initiative
  • Explore sustainability of oral health screenings
  • Develop a referral system between medical/dental/early childhood/social services
  • Create consistent messaging and promotional materials
  • Build demand for services (from parents and screening sites)
  • Build capacity for providing screenings across multiple settings including MCH/SHCN
• Develop/present professional development MCH staff and partners
  • Annual update to Oral Health 101 course
  • Oral Health and early childhood (home visitors)
  • Oral Health and Pregnancy (home visitors)
  • Oral health and CSHCN (staff as pilot then offer to families in regions)
• Develop/present oral health workshops for families with children with special needs
  • Cleft Lip/Cleft Palate (CLCP) and oral health needs information
  • Address barriers and issues with CLCP Medicaid claims
• Provide technical assistance to child care providers for oral screenings for children in their care
  • Evaluation plan to measure adoption of healthy habits as a result of taking online child care courses on oral health
  • Integrate goal setting into online oral health education for child care providers
• Integrate oral health messaging into school age programs
  • Create a toolkit for schools to reach children and adolescents about healthy habits and choices by integrating oral health and components of Thirsty for Health curriculum
  • Introduce Thirsty for Health into new elementary and middle schools
  • Create and oral health presentation toolkit that can be used by program staff or local dental professionals at child and youth programs
  • Create Thirsty for Health model for after-school programs
• Increase utilization of Medicaid, CHIP, and Health Insurance Exchange services through education and referral
  • Assist MCOs with educating KanCare members on their current dental benefits
  • Educate navigators on dental insurance options in the marketplace to assist with enrollment
  • Prepare an educational campaign prior to open enrollment about dental options
• Increase access to primary and specialty care in underserved areas
  • Conduct oral health needs assessment to determine barriers to access to oral healthcare for vulnerable populations such as CSHCN
  • Use data from needs assessment to craft advocacy messages to legislators around CSHCN-specific policies, reimbursement rates, tele-dental, etc.

 

Oral Health Services for CSHCN: KS-SHCN Care Coordinators will continue working with families to assure they have a dental health home and are receiving preventive oral health care services. For program participants with Cleft Lip/Cleft Palate, KS-SHCN will work with Medicaid, dentist, oral surgeons, and community partners invested in oral health care in Kansas to assure children receive the care they need to support optimal health.