Anna L. Christensen

Unintended pregnancy and perinatal depression trajectories in low-income, high-risk Hispanic immigrants

Perinatal depression is a prevalent and detrimental condition. Determining modifiable factors associated with it would identify opportunities for prevention. This paper: 1) identifies depressive symptom trajectories and heterogeneity in those trajectories during pregnancy through the first-year postpartum, and 2) examines the association between unintended pregnancy and depressive symptoms. Depressive symptoms (BDI-II) were collected from low-income Hispanic immigrants (n=215) five times from early pregnancy to 12-months postpartum. The sample was at high-risk for perinatal depression and recruited from two prenatal care settings. Growth mixture modeling (GMM) was used to identify distinct trajectories of depressive symptoms over the perinatal period. Multinomial logistic regression was then conducted to examine the association between unintended pregnancy (reported at baseline) and the depression trajectory patterns. Three distinct trajectory patterns of depressive symptoms were identified: high during pregnancy, but low postpartum (“Pregnancy High”: 9.8%); borderline during pregnancy, with a postpartum increase (“Postpartum High”: 10.2%); and low throughout pregnancy and postpartum (“Perinatal Low”: 80.0%). Unintended pregnancy was not associated with the “Pregnancy High” pattern, but was associated with a marginally significant nearly four fold increase in risk of the “Postpartum High” pattern in depressive symptoms (RRR=3.95, p<0.10). Family planning is a potential strategy for the prevention of postpartum depression. Women who report unintended pregnancies during prenatal care must be educated of their increased risk, even if they do not exhibit antenatal depressive symptoms. Routine depression screening should occur postpartum, and referral to culturally appropriate treatment should follow positive screening results.

The pregnancy experience scale–brief version

The role of maternal stress during pregnancy remains a focus of academic and clinical inquiry, yet there are few instruments available that measure pregnancy-specific contributors to maternal psychological state. This report examines the psychometric properties of an abbreviated version of the Pregnancy Experience Scale (PES) designed to evaluate maternal appraisal of positive and negative stressors during pregnancy. The PES-Brief consists of the top 10 items endorsed as pregnancy hassles and 10 pregnancy uplifts from the original scale. The PES-Brief was administered to 112 women with low risk, singleton pregnancies five times between 24 and 38 weeks gestation. Scoring includes frequency and intensity measures for hassles and uplifts, as well as composite measures for the relation between the two. Internal reliability, test–retest reliability and convergent validity were comparable with the original version. The PES-Brief provides an economical source of information on stress appraisal and emotional valence towards pregnancy.

Associations between practice-reported medical homeness and health care utilization among publicly insured children.

BACKGROUND The patient-centered medical home (PCMH) is widely promoted as a model to improve the quality of primary care and lead to more efficient use of health care services. Few studies have examined the relationship between PCMH implementation at the practice level and health care utilization by children. Existing studies show mixed results. METHODS Using practice-reported PCMH assessments and Medicaid claims from child-serving practices in 3 states participating in the Childrens Health Insurance Program Reauthorization Act of 2009 Quality Demonstration Grant Program, this study estimates the association between medical homeness (tertiles) and receipt of well-child care and nonurgent, preventable, or avoidable emergency department (ED) use. Multilevel logistic regression models are estimated on data from 32 practices in Illinois (IL) completing the National Committee for Quality Assurances (NCQA) medical home self-assessment and 32 practices in North Carolina (NC) and South Carolina (SC) completing the Medical Home Index (MHI) or Medical Home Index-Revised Short Form (MHI-RSF). RESULTS Medical homeness was not associated with receipt of age-appropriate well-child visits in either sample. Associations between nonurgent, preventable, or avoidable ED visits and medical homeness varied. No association was seen among practices in NC and SC that completed the MHI/MHI-RSF. Children in practices in IL with the highest tertile NCQA self-assessment scores were less likely to have a nonurgent, preventable, or avoidable ED visit than children in practices with low (odds ratio 0.65; 95% confidence interval 0.47-0.92; P < .05) and marginally less likely to have such a visit compared with children in practices with medium tertile scores (odds ratio 0.72, 95% confidence interval 0.52-1.01; P = .06). CONCLUSIONS Higher levels of medical homeness may be associated with lower nonurgent, preventable, or avoidable ED use by publicly insured children. Robust longitudinal studies using multiple measures of medical homeness are needed to confirm this observation.

Spillover of Ratings of Patient- and Family-Centered Care.

As primary care models increasingly include nonphysician team members, more attention should be paid to patient- and family-centered care (PFCC) among medical assistants (MAs). The aims of this article are to describe parent perceptions of PFCC by MAs and assess associations between MA PFCC and other perceptions of their care experience. To assess PFCC, we administered the CARE (Consultation and Relational Empathy) measure to the parent/guardian of 360 children following a primary care visit. Perceptions of PFCC by MAs were significantly associated with 6 of 7 other measures of patient experience, including PFCC by the physician, treatment by the receptionist, and satisfaction with wait time. Each team member can potentially shape perceptions of care in ways that could “spill over” into other parts of the visit.

A Public Health Approach to Addressing Perinatal Depression

An estimated half a million women give birth each year in the United States; at least 13% suffer from perinatal depression. Health care professionals are essential partners in reducing the burden of this illness on women, their offspring and their families. We provide a framework for public healthclinical collaboration that promotes a population-based model for addressing perinatal depression. This approach builds upon the strengths of the current clinical model of care and supplements this individualized, treatment-focused approach. The five components of our framework provide a vision for a multidisciplinary approach to perinatal depression, including screening and public health surveillance, the influence of social and biological processes, and the design of effective service delivery models to diverse populations. A public health approach to perinatal depression expands the continuum of services available to women to include access to evidence-based preventive interventions in addition to treatment services.

Implementing Electronic Health Record Default Settings to Reduce Opioid Overprescribing: A Pilot Study

Objective To pilot test the effectiveness, feasibility, and acceptability of instituting a 15-pill quantity default in the electronic health record for new Schedule II opioid prescriptions. Design A mixed-methods pilot study in two health systems, including pre-post analysis of prescribed opioid quantity and focus groups or interviews with prescribers and health system administrators. Methods We implemented a 15-pill electronic health record default for new Schedule II opioids and assessed opioid quantity before and after implementation using electronic health record data on 6,390 opioid prescriptions from 448 prescribers. We then analyzed themes from focus groups and interviews with four staff members and six prescribers. Results The proportion of opioid prescriptions for 15 pills increased at both sites after adding an electronic health record default, with one reaching statistical significance (from 4.1% to 7.2% at CHC, P = 0.280, and 15.9% to 37.2% at WVU, P < 0.001). The proportion of 15-pill prescriptions increased among high-prescribing departments and among most high- and low-frequency prescribers, except for low-frequency prescribers at CHC. Sites reported limited challenges in instituting the default, although ease of implementation varied by electronic health record vendor. Most prescribers were not aware of the default change and stated that they made prescribing decisions based on patient clinical characteristics rather than defaults. Conclusions This pilot provides initial evidence that changing default settings can increase the number of prescriptions at the default level. This low-cost and relatively simple intervention could have an impact on opioid overprescribing. However, default settings should be selected carefully to avoid unintended consequences.

What Factors Influence States’ Capacity to Report Children’s Health Care Quality Measures? A Multiple-Case Study

Objectives The objective of this study was to describe factors that influence the ability of state Medicaid agencies to report the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ (CMS) core set of children’s health care quality measures (Child Core Set). Methods We conducted a multiple-case study of four high-performing states participating in the Children’s Health Insurance Program Reauthorization Act (CHIPRA) Quality Demonstration Grant Program: Illinois, Maine, Pennsylvania, and Oregon. Cases were purposively selected for their diverse measurement approaches and used data from 2010 to 2015, including 154 interviews, semiannual grant progress reports, and annual public reports on Child Core Set measures. We followed Yin’s multiple-case study methodology to describe how and why each state increased the number of measures reported to CMS. Results All four states increased the number of Child Core Set measures reported to CMS during the grant period. Each took a different approach to reporting, depending on the available technical, organizational, and behavioral inputs in the state. Reporting capacity was influenced by a state’s Medicaid data availability, ability to link to other state data systems, past experience with quality measurement, staff time and technical expertise, and demand for the measures. These factors were enhanced by CHIPRA Quality Demonstration grant funding and other federal capacity building activities, as hypothesized in our conceptual framework. These and other states have made progress reporting the Child Core Set since 2010. Conclusion With financial support and investment in state data systems and organizational factors, states can overcome challenges to reporting most of the Child Core Set measures.