Childbirth Connection today released two
landmark reports that create a framework for revamping maternity care in
the U.S. and advancing health care reform: "2020 Vision for a High
Quality, High Value Maternity Care System" and "Blueprint for Action."
The reports were developed through an extensive multi-year collaboration
with more than 100 maternity care leaders representing industry
stakeholders -- from hospitals and health plans to consumers and providers.
These reports and related papers have just been published in a special
supplement of Women's Health Issues.
"Recognizing that rapid gains in the quality, value and outcomes of
maternity care are well within reach, Childbirth Connection launched its Transforming Maternity Care
project several years ago," said Maureen Corry, executive director,
Childbirth Connection. Although a wealth of
high-quality evidence and experiences of high-performing segments of the
maternity care system were readily available to improve maternity care,
these resources were not impacting most women and newborns. "It was time to
act and we called upon key leaders across the health care system to develop
a long-term vision for the future of maternity care in the United States.
This vision served as a starting point for a collaborative process to
develop action steps for broad-based maternity care system improvement,"
said Corry.
Maternity care is the runaway leader in hospital charges and is the number
one reason for hospitalization in the country. Maternal and newborn
hospital charges alone exceeded $86 billion in 2007, with employers and
private insurers paying for 50% of all births and Medicaid paying for 42%.
While most childbearing women and their babies are healthy and at low risk,
the current style of maternity care is technology-intensive. Costly
childbirth procedures that entail risk are overused and wasteful, while
proven ones that are generally safer and less expensive are underutilized.
Marked disparities in access, quality and outcomes persist, with many
maternal and newborn health indicators moving in the wrong direction. The
return on investment for our significant expenditure in this important
sector is poor.
"The good news is that every challenge is an opportunity for improvement
that can benefit millions of mothers and babies annually. The '2020 Vision'
developed by a multi-disciplinary, multi-stakeholder team, puts forth the
values, principles and attributes of an optimal maternity care system and
describes fundamental goals for a system meeting those criteria," said Rima
Jolivet, Transforming Maternity Care Project Director, Childbirth
Connection. "With the '2020 Vision' in hand, five stakeholder workgroups
collaborated to develop reports with recommendations and action steps for
moving toward the vision," said Jolivet.
Stakeholder workgroup chairs presented their reports and recommendations at
an invitational policy symposium commemorating Childbirth Connection's 90th
anniversary. Transforming Maternity Care: A High Value Proposition was held
at Georgetown University, Washington DC, in April 2009. Invited
discussants, moderators and the audience provided comments to strengthen
the reports and recommendations. The Transforming Maternity Care Steering
Committee then synthesized the workgroup reports and additional feedback
into the direction-setting report, "Blueprint for Action: Steps Toward a
High-Quality, High-Value Maternity Care System." The Blueprint answers the
question "Who needs to do what, to, with and for whom to improve the
quality of maternity care over the next five years?" Actionable strategies
to improve maternity care quality and value are centered on eleven critical
focus areas for change: