Network to Reduce Infant Mortality

Initiatives

Collaborative Improvement and Innovation Network to Reduce Infant Mortality (Infant Mortality CoIIN)

A multiyear national movement engaging federal, state and local leaders, public and private agencies, professionals, and communities to employ quality improvement, innovation and collaborative learning to reduce infant mortality and improve birth outcomes. Infant Mortality CoIIN has identified six strategic areas to focus on:

  • SIDS/SUID/Safe Sleep: Improve safe sleep practices
  • Smoking Cessation: Reduce smoking before, during and/or after pregnancy
  • Preconception/Interconception Health: Promote healthy birth spacing and reduce unintended pregnancy
  • Social Determinants of Health: Incorporate evidence-based policies/programs and place-based strategies to improve social determinants of health and equity in birth outcomes
  • Prevention of Preterm and Early Term Births: Increase appropriate use of 17 OH progesterone, a hormone given to prevent pre-term labor, and/or reduce early elective deliveries (i.e., before 40 weeks gestation) 
  • Risk-appropriate Perinatal Care (perinatal regionalization): Increase the delivery of higher-risk infants and mothers at appropriate level facilities

Keep scrolling, or use these quick links, to learn more.

Webinar | Issue Briefs | Resources | Related Content | Project Videos

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Status: Complete

Phase one: 19 states in regions IV, V, and VI, September 2012 to August 2014 led by Abt Associates with NICHQ as subcontractor; Phase two: National Expansion, September 2013 to September 2017, led by NICHQ

  • Who: Multifaceted stakeholders from many disciplines and agencies both within and across state boundaries. In 2012, IM CoIIN began with 13 states from the southern and southwestern U.S., with six other Midwestern states joining the effort in 2013. In 2014, IM CoIIN was expanded to the remaining 31 states and nine jurisdictions and refocused on national collaboration versus regional collaboration. 
  • Funder: The project was funded by the Maternal and Child Health Bureau (MCHB) of the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) in the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).
  • Our Role: In the first phase of the IM CoIIN, we provided project teams with technical assistance on how to incorporate quality improvement principles into their work. In the nationally focused phase, we led state teams and provided the data infrastructure, online community and continuing expert technical assistance needed to support their efforts. We worked with several national partners, including AMCHP, ASTHO and the March of Dimes.

Webinar Still

Results Webinar: Big Wins and Next Steps in Addressing Infant Mortality

In a recent webinar, NICHQ shared the results and impact of the work to date, strategies that led to success, key resources and next steps to keep the momentum going.

View this webinar, as well as our full expert series here

Project Videos

Methods for Moving a Nation: The Collaborative Improvement and Innovation Network to Reduce Infant Mortality is cleverly combining three key methods for change—collaborative learning, innovation networks and quality improvement—to achieve results in reducing infant mortality across the country. Hear from project participants about how this novel approach is having a profound impact in helping more children reach their first birthdays and beyond.

Saving Babies: Efforts in three cities to reduce infant mortality rates are shared in this documentary about efforts of the NICHQ-led Collaborative Improvement and Innovation Network to Reduce Infant Mortality
 

Tackling a National Embarrassment: The U.S. infant mortality rate, one of the worst among all industrialized nations, is a national embarrassment. But teams from every state, jurisdiction and territory are joining together to find innovative solutions to preventing and reducing infant mortality across the U.S., with a particular focus on eliminating racial disparities, through the NICHQ-led Collaborative Improvement and Innovation Network (CoIIN) to Reduce Infant Mortality. Get inspired for this great movement by hearing from participants as they begin their work.

Precious Loss: The infant mortality rate in Colorado overall is the 5th lowest in the United States. But within that ranking is one of country’s most striking racial disparities. According to the state health department, 12 black babies die before their first birthday out of every 1,000 born. This rate of infant death is triple that of white babies in Colorado. Rocky Mountain PBS News investigates what could explain this disparity, and what local and national organizations are pursuing to eliminate it.