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Indian River County Healthy Start Coalition, Inc. ' Healthy Families Indian River Program ` Children 's Services Advisory Committee Grant 2006-07 B. PROGRAM NEED STATEMENT (Entire Section B not to exceed one page) 1 a) What is the unacceptable condition requiring change? Pregnancy and raising a child places many new or additional burdens and stressors on a family, including financial, emotional and even physical stress. Along with the joys of parenthood can be the realization of the major responsibilities of raising a child to be healthy and ready to learn by the time they enter their school years. HF focuses on families with risk factors for child abuse by addressing parenting components that improves parent/child interactions and enhances overall brain development. b)Who has the need? Factors associated with increased risk for child abuse, poor birth outcomes and poor infant/child growth and development include: marital status, age of mother, moving three times in one year, alcohol or substance use, high stress level, not wanting the pregnancy, depression, history of mental health counseling, and partner being unemployed. In many cases, these risk factors are more prevalent for low income families. Indian River County residents had 1 ,056 births in 2002. Of these births, 62. 8% were from white mothers, 15 .3% black, 19.0% Hispanic and 2.9% "other" mothers. In 2002, almost half, or 45% of all births are covered under Medicaid or indigent funding. Of all the births in 2002, 39. 6 % of babies born were to unwed mothers, with black unwed births at 76.5 %. In terms of education status of the newborn's mother, 28.3% of the mothers did not have a 12'h grade education or GED. c)Where do they live? Healthy Families — IRC serves families from the entire county, with 53% served from south county, and 47% from the north county area. d)Provide local, state, or national trend data, with reference source, that corroborates that this is an area of need. All Healthy Families Florida programs are modeled after the highly successful national HF America initiative and are recognized by Abuse America/Healthy Families America as providers of high quality home visitation services. Critical program elements have been defined by over 20 years of research and represent best practices in home visitation. There is 20% less maltreatment of children in families parti6pating in Healthy Families than all families in the target area. 1 2. Identify similar programs that are currently serving the needs of your targeted population; b) Explain how these existing programs are under-serving the targeted population of your program. Healthy Start Care Coordination provides ongoing case management to high-risk pregnant women and infants, placing emphasis on the pregnant woman to help ensure a healthy birth outcome. The Healthy Families IRC program is designed to begin prenatally or at the birth of the child and is a voluntary program. No other child abuse prevention program is voluntary. Healthy Families focuses on parent/child interaction until the parents complete the program or the child reaches age five. TLC Newborn also focuses on interaction, but is not a home visiting program. The focus of Healthy Families IRC is to prevent child abuse. Healthy Families requires low caseloads be maintained at an average of 20 families per worker, but no more than 25. Healthy Start has case loads of 50-70. Healthy Families participants receive Weekly visitation and must demonstrate improved knowledge to move to less visitation. Healthy Start's highest level of service requires twice monthly visitation. The low caseloads and the extended duration of services greatly enhance the opportunity to positively impact families. Healthy Families-IRC is the only program in Indian River designed to serve families for up to five years. Healthy Families Evaluation Report 1999-2003 Executive Summary. Williams, Stem & Associates. V. 5