Unique Profiles of Postpartum Family Needs and Evidence of Racial and Ethnic Disparities: Insights from Community Implementation of Family Connects

Overview

Journal J Racial Ethn Health Disparities

Specialties Public Health
Social Sciences

Date 2024 Apr 29

PMID 38683250

Authors

Yu Bai

Helen Milojevich

Kenneth A Dodge

W Benjamin Goodman

Karen ODonnell

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Objectives: To delineate specific family needs during the postpartum period using data from Family Connects (FC), a universal home-visiting initiative, and to scrutinize potential racial and ethnic disparities in these needs.

Method: FC implementation data spanned from July 1, 2009, to August 31, 2021, in seven counties across the USA. Data encompassed nurse-led in-home assessments for 34,119 families. Nurses evaluated needs across four domains (healthcare, parenting/childcare, safe home, and parent support) comprising 12 risk factors.

Findings: Overall, families reported high levels of need, and community connections were facilitated for 57% of visited families. Significant differences in need profiles between whites and minority groups were revealed, reflecting both disparity and uniqueness. Employing the Oaxaca decomposition approach, we found that racial/ethnic disparities in socioeconomic attributes were associated with racial/ethnic gaps in the need profiles.

Conclusions: The event of giving birth is both high risk and high opportunity for preventive intervention. Home-visiting programs, as an evidence-based approach, must address the diverse spectrum of familial needs comprehensively.

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