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• Inter-Tribal Council of Michigan and MPHI Supporting Promotion of Breastfeeding in Tribal Communities
• Avian Influenza A (H7N9) Virus
• MPHI Launches Performance Management/Quality Improvement Training for State, Local, and Tribal Public Health Practitioners
• Federal Agency Honors Michigan’s Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) Project
• DCH Director Haveman: Health Care Changes Coming
• MPHI‘s Director of the National Center for Child Death Review Raising Awareness About Violence Against Children
• The National Network of Public Health Institutes selects Dr. Vincent Lafronza as its new CEO (more)
• Annual Child Death Review Report Released, Recommends Prevention Strategies
• MPHI receives $2.9 million federal award to improve children’s genetic services in 7 states
• Department of Defense awards $1.2 million, 3-year grant award to MPHI/MSU team to research Veteran’s health needs
• MPHI/MDCH Win CMS Innovation Award
• New Quality Improvement Guidebook Available
• State Encourages Healthy Lifestyle to Combat Obesity
• Drowning is Leading Cause of Unintentional Deaths Worldwide (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention)
• Reduce Your Risk of Drowning (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention)
• MPHI's Anissa Devlaminck now a Certified Meeting Professional (CMP)
• MPHI's Annual Report wins national 2011 Aster Award for "Excellence in Medical Marketing"
• Michigan Surpassing 48 States Shows Autos Drive US Economy
• National Center for the Review & Prevention of Child Deaths publishes Summer Newsletter
• Foundations Can Drive Investments in Public Health Infrastructure
• MPHI Announces Healthy Food Drive
• MPHI named as foundation intermediary for the Michigan Convergence Partnership aimed at promoting healthy people and healthy places
• MPHI's Teri Covington testifies to Congress on Child Deaths Due to Maltreatments
• Child Deaths in Michigan 2007-2008
• MPHI Awarded Five-Year, $4.5 Million Federal Grant
• MPHI Participates in Race for the Cure
• A Day out with Habitat for Humanity
• “On My Back, Please” Infant Safe Sleep Campaign
• U.S. FDA and Consumer Product Safety Commission Warn Against Use of Infant Sleep Positioners, Based on Recommendations Made by a Michigan Child Death Review Team
• MPHI Program Director Presents at Injury Prevention Conference
• News from the National Child Death Review Resource Center
• Vaccine Information for Adults
• Staying on Top of Health Reform: An Early Look at Workforce Challenges in Five States
• The Affordable Care Act of 2010 – What Nurses Need to Know to Help Their Patients: A Guide.
• MPHI releases paper on Health Information Technology
• NNPHI publishes "Partnering for the Public's Health: The Role of Public Health Institutes as Fiscal Agents and Intermediaries"
• MPHI Receives MAHP 2010 President's Award
• MPHI Board of Directors discusses Health Care Reform
• MPHI Webcasting Wins Rich Media Impact Award - Government
• MPHI Highlighted in GLITR Report
• MPHI's Teri Covington co-authors article on Child Abuse & Neglect
• Annisa Stanley of MPHI named Planner of the Year 2009
• MPHI featured in StreamingMedia.com article
• MPHI collaborative database uses Newborn Blood Spot Screening to detect children with Genetic Abnormalities
• MPHI Program Director Shannon Stotenbur-Wing speaks out in the Oakland Press on patterns of Child Abuse
• $24 Million MPHI Project Will Boost Health Information Exchange
• MPHI participates in Every Child Matters Capital Hill Press Event

Inter-Tribal Council of Michigan and MPHI Supporting Promotion of Breastfeeding in Tribal Communities

The Center for Healthy Communities at MPHI partnered with the Inter-Tribal Council of Michigan (ITCM) and Tribes throughout Michigan on their Breastfeeding Project, to create a practical toolkit for tribal community members and practitioners who are working toward creating worksite environments that promote and support breastfeeding. The project, funded through the National REACH Coalition (a CDC Community Transformation Grant National Network grantee), aims to increase the number of infants who are breastfed within all Michigan tribal communities, to positively impact obesity and other chronic diseases. The toolkit contains culturally relevant information, images, tools, and resources for increasing understanding and implementation of workplace policies and practices that support breastfeeding by employers and tribal leaders.

To view or download a copy of the toolkit, please visit the ITCM website: http://www.itcmi.org/departments/maternal-and-early-childhood-services/

Avian Influenza A (H7N9) Virus

On April 1, 2013, the World Health Organization (WHO) first reported 3 human infections with a new influenza A (H7N9) virus in China. Since then, additional cases have been reported

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MPHI Launches Performance Management/Quality Improvement Training for State, Local, and Tribal Public Health Practitioners

We are pleased to share with the public health community a new online performance management training designed specifically with and for state, local, and tribal public health practitioners.

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Federal Agency Honors Michigan’s Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) Project

The Health Resources and Services Administration, a Department of Health and Human Services federal agency, awarded the Michigan Department of Community Health (MDCH) TBI Services and Prevention Council (SPC) the 2013 Federal TBI Program Award for Most Adapted State Agency Grant Product. This award recognizes Michigan for developing a widely used or recognized product that has been adapted for use in other states.

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DCH Director Haveman: Health Care Changes Coming

The state can expect some substantial changes in the way health care is delivered in the coming years, and the Department of Community Health will help to coordinate those changes, Director Jim Haveman told the House Health Policy Committee on Tuesday. While there have been some changes, much of the health care system still concentrates on curing illness rather than on wellness, and the system is too fragmented, Mr. Haveman told committee members.

Mental health care, said the former director of the Department of Mental Health, is a prime example of the fragmentation. "When we first started this system, people in physical health wanted nothing to do with people with mental illness, so we crated this whole community mental health system, and quite successfully," he said. "But now the effort is coordinating services."

Some of the change, he said, will be driven by the new federal health care law. The law, for instance, prohibits reimbursements to emergency rooms for patients who return to them often, he said. "Now that emergency rooms are not being reimbursed for multiple users of emergency rooms, hospitals said we've got to do something different," he said. In many cases, they are developing clinics for those who do not truly need emergency care, he said.

But he said the goal is to get all residents into a "medical home" where residents' ongoing health is tracked. "We're moving in the United States away from a curative model that is more hospital-based to one that is more preventative and puts more emphasis on personal responsibility," he said. One of the department's goals, he said, is to ensure residents have access to those preventative services. "We touch everybody in the state," Mr. Haveman said. "We want the community you represent to be healthy. We know there are gaps. We're going to work on those gaps." The trick, he said, will be not interfering with the wellness programs many health care providers and businesses already have in place. "We want to complement it," he said.

But he said 88 percent of health care costs are related to lifestyle choices. "If we start focusing in on those, we can change that curve of the cost of health care," he said. Some of the effort to fill the gaps and change the course of health care will come from a new innovation fund that will be announced as part of the budget on Thursday, Mr. Haveman said. Some of the coordination will come through better use of electronic medical records and other technology, he said. "I want a shared IT system in this state that works," he said.

Mr. Haveman did not, though, have a ready answer to questions from Rep. Mike Shirkey (R-Clarklake) whether any of the state's efforts at health care reform might duplicate efforts at the federal level. "We have a limited amount of resources to spread around," Mr. Shirkey said. And Mr. Haveman said the state is largely making the most of the funds it has. Improvements, he said, will come at the local level.

One area where the state will be leading change is in long-term care. "There've been a lot of attempts to look at long term care, but we'll do that constructively and with long term care folks at the table," he said. As part of that effort, the Michigan Quality Community Care Council will be returning to the mix, Mr. Haveman said, noting he is now a member of the council. "There's been a lot of controversy regarding that," he said of the council, not directly mentioning the union of home health care workers that had been created under the name of the council, the reason it had funding pulled by past legislatures. Mr. Haveman said the program did provide important services. "The registry and the criminal checks is an important part of that process," he said of providing home health care. "The registry is going to be taken over and will continue, as will the background checks." The registry needs work and some marketing, he said, noting there are currently only 300 service providers listed on it.

Improving the state's health care system is not only important for well-being of residents, but also for their employment, Mr. Haveman said. A strong health care system attracts other development, he said. "(Businesses) want to see a stable delivery system; they want to see heath care costs reasonable," he said. In part that will mean the state helping local hospitals to remain healthy. "When it closes, the businesses leave, so we got to do everything we can to keep the system stable," he said of local hospitals. There is not, however, a current plan on the table from the administration to change the certificate of need process, Mr. Haveman said, either in response to changes in federal health care laws or changes in the overall marketplace.

Mr. Haveman did not say whether Governor Rick Snyder would be proposing to expand Medicaid as allowed under the ACA.

MPHI‘s Director of the National Center for Child Death Review Raising Awareness About Violence Against Children.

In the aftermath of the mass murder of 20 children at Connecticut’s Sandy Hook Elementary School, child advocates are trying to raise awareness of the alarming rate that kids in America continue to be victims of violence, and questioning why it goes largely unreported and unrecognized by the public.

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The National Network of Public Health Institutes selects Dr. Vincent Lafronza as its new CEO (more)

Created in 2001 as a forum for public health institutes (PHIs), today NNPHI convenes its members and partners at the local, state, and national levels in efforts to address critical health issues. NNPHI's mission is to support national public health system initiatives and strengthen PHIs to promote multi-sector activities resulting in measurable improvements of public health structures, systems, and outcomes.

For more information, please click here.

Annual Child Death Review Report Released, Recommends Prevention Strategies

The 9th annual report on child fatalities in Michigan is now available. The report is based on data collected from local teams who reviewed the deaths of the children in their communities in 2009 and 2010, and contains recommendations to state policymakers on ways that future children's deaths may be prevented. 

More than 1,200 community representatives in 62 counties reviewed 1,283 child deaths and determined that more than half (61 percent) were preventable. 

The report includes recommendations for increased education campaigns to prevent drug overdoses by teens, and new laws requiring health practitioners to uniformly educate parents on how to prevent sleep-related infant deaths.

In the report's section on sleep-related infant deaths, it notes that "in locations where the most thorough and vigorous scene investigations and caregiver interviews are conducted, the number of deaths to infants who were known to have been on their backs, alone and in a crib free of suffocation hazards drops to nearly zero."

"Although sleep-related infant deaths can and do occur in all types of families, there are groups at elevated risk. Blacks, American Indians and low-income families have experienced sleep-related infant deaths at much higher rates than other groups," according to the report.

You can download a copy of the report here.

MPHI receives $2.9 million federal award to improve children’s genetic services in 7 states

MPHI Systems Reform received a Notice of Award from the Department of Health & Human Services, Maternal and Child Health Bureau for the Region 4 Genetics Collaborative. The project award was $2,993,000 and will support regional collaborative work of families, genetic service providers, newborn screening laboratories, and public health. Stakeholders from Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Minnesota, Ohio, and Wisconsin will work together over the next five years to accomplish the following goals: 1) Improve effective follow-up for children who have genetic conditions; 2) Improve access to genetic services for children who have genetic conditions and their families; 3) Increase the number of children who have genetic conditions and their families who receive quality genetic services; and 4) Improve the timely adoption and implementation of SACHDNC recommendations by Region 4 states.

Department of Defense awards $1.2 million, 3-year grant award to MPHI/MSU team to research Veteran’s health needs

The Department of Defense Psychological Health and Traumatic Brain Injury Research Program Research Program of the Office of the Congressionally Directed Medical Research Programs (CDMRP) has awarded Dr. Adrian Blow, Michigan State University and Dr. Lisa Gorman, Michigan Public Health Institute a three-year grant for “Risk, Resiliency, and Coping in National Guard Families.” The first aim of this study is to identify characteristics of risk and resiliency associated with NG service member and family adjustment. The second aim is to describe individual and familial processes associated with adaptation to deployment and reintegration and compare these processes across different family types.

The project will expand current models of family stress and adaptation by describing the experience of deployment and reintegration among multiple members of the same family. Some of the family processes that will be useful for military family program efforts include identifying resource utilization patterns among resilient families, identifying common themes of meaning ascribed to military life by resilient families who live in both rural and urban communities, and identifying positive coping strategies utilized for NG families at different developmental stages across the life cycle. 
 
The project will lead to improved theoretical understandings of deployment processes for military families, particularly families in the reserve component. These findings will inform development and adaptation of evidence-based family and community resilience programs and enhance methods that build and sustain strong relationships within military families.  Drs. Blow and Gorman will accomplish this project through collaboration with the Michigan National Guard and partnership with colleagues at University of Michigan Department of Psychiatry and Virginia Tech Department of Human Development.

MPHI/MDCH Win CMS Innovation Award

Under this initiative, innovative projects across the country are testing creative ways to deliver high-quality health care services at lower costs. The Health Care Innovation Awards will support public and private organizations including clinicians, health systems, private and public payers, faith-based institutions, community-based organizations and local governments.

Project Title: “Michigan pathways to better health”
Geographic Reach: Michigan
Funding Amount: $14,145,784
Estimated 3-Year Savings: $17,498,641
Summary: The Michigan Public Health Institute, partnering with the Michigan Department of Community Health and the Community Health Access Project, is receiving an award to integrate community health workers (CHWs) into primary care teams in the county of Ingham and cities of Saginaw and Muskegon. These CHWs will coach patients on self-management of conditions and encourage regular primary care visits. In addition, the program will connect at-risk populations with local care and support services that address social determinants of health that impede achievement of positive health outcomes. This “Pathways Community Hub” model will decrease hospitalizations and emergency department visits by improving adherence to therapy, improving access to primary care and increasing use of preventive care and support services. Over a three-year period, the Michigan Public Health Institute will train over 231 people and hire 87 people to serve as community health workers, providing care self-management coaching, care navigation services, and care coordination services.

For more information, please click here.

New Quality Improvement Guidebook Available

Embracing Quality in Public Health: A Practitioner’s Quality Improvement Guidebook (2nd edition) is now available.

The updated and expanded Guidebook reflects the practice-based experience and expertise developed through the Multi-State Learning Collaborative and other public health QI work, and features:

• Updated information about customers, clients and stakeholders; using the PDSA Cycle; writing an aim statement; using data and measuring improvement; using QI tools; and evaluation
• New information about quality fundamentals, organizing a QI project, and building a culture of quality in public health
• Real-world case studies illustrating the use of QI in public health

The Guidebook can be downloaded for free at www.mphiaccredandqi.org/guidebook.aspx

State Encourages Healthy Lifestyle to Combat Obesity

Stepping up efforts to get Michigan residents to live healthy lifestyles to combat obesity, Community Health Director Olga Dazzo announced a statewide plan to get residents to take four actions and follow four measures.

The effort plays off a proposal made last year by Governor Rick Snyder to pay attention to four measures - blood pressure, blood sugar, blood cholesterol and body mass index - to help reduce a lack of physical activity and obesity.

The proposal also encourages communities to take steps to help residents live a healthier lifestyle, by encouraging such things as walkable communities.

There is nothing new or dramatic in the four activities the state is encouraging, and the state has certainly actively encouraged improvements in these activities in the past.

The four activities are: eating a proper healthy diet, exercising regularly, getting an annual physical examination and avoiding all tobacco use. Tying that to the four measures of blood pressure, blood sugar, cholesterol and BMI is the 4X4 plan the state is promoting.

Ms. Dazzo officially launched the program Monday in Ypsilanti, in part to note efforts made by the Washtenaw County Public Health Department since getting state funding in 2005 to promote greater wellness. The department helped set up a farmer's market, is encouraging efforts to make communities more walkable and is trying to get provisions passed to block all tobacco use in county parks.

The department also helped set up new walking areas and other recreational activities in Recreation Park where the press conference was held.

Estimates are that 32 percent of the adults in Michigan are obese, while 17 percent of young people are obese. Michigan is one the 10 heaviest states in the U.S., and chronic health conditions that can be related to obesity cost the state an estimated $3.1 billion in 2008, Department of Community Health officials.

The state also unveiled websites it said could help individuals plan changes to embark on a healthier lifestyle.

Drowning is Leading Cause of Unintentional Death Worldwide (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention)

Drowning is a leading cause of unintentional injury death worldwide, and the highest rates are among children (1). Overall, drowning death rates in the United States have declined in the last decade; however, drowning is the leading cause of injury death among children aged 1–4 years (2,3). In 2001, approximately 3,300 persons died from unintentional drowning in recreational water settings, and an estimated 5,600 were treated in emergency departments (EDs) (4). To update information on the incidence and characteristics of fatal and nonfatal unintentional drowning in the United States, CDC analyzed death certificate data from the National Vital Statistics System and injury data from the National Electronic Injury Surveillance System – All Injury Program (NEISS-AIP) for 2005–2009. The results indicated that each year an average of 3,880 persons were victims of fatal drowning and an estimated 5,789 persons were treated in U.S. hospital EDs for nonfatal drowning. Death rates and nonfatal injury rates were highest among children aged ≤4 years; these children most commonly drowned in swimming pools. The drowning death rate among males (2.07 per 100,000 population) was approximately four times that for females (0.54). To prevent drowning, all parents and children should learn survival swimming skills. In addition, 1) environmental protections (e.g., isolation pool fences and lifeguards) should be in place; 2) alcohol use should be avoided while swimming, boating, water skiing, or supervising children; 3) lifejackets should be used by all boaters and weaker swimmers; and 4) all caregivers and supervisors should have training in cardiopulmonary resuscitation.

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Reduce Your Risk of Drowning (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention)

When you're spending the day splashing around at the pool, beach or lake, drowning may not be the first thing on your mind. Yet drowning ranks fifth among the leading causes of unintentional injury death in the United States and kills more toddlers 1-4 years old than anything but birth defects.1 About ten people die every day from unintentional drowning. Of these, two are children 14 or younger. The good news is that most of these deaths are predictable and preventable. Being aware of the risks and taking safety precautions are proven ways to prevent drowning injuries and deaths. Learn the facts and take action to protect yourself and the ones you love from drowning.

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MPHI's Anissa DeVlaminck now a Certified Meeting Professional (CMP)

The Convention and Industry Council is pleased to announce that 489 individuals passed the January 7, 2012 CMP examination. The examination was held in 15 locations throughout North America as well as Italy, Japan, Singapore, and South Korea.

The Michigan Public Health Institute's (MPHI's) Center for Child and Family Health department would like to congratulate our employee, Anissa DeVlaminck, CMP on her successful completion of this intensive study and training program.

Click here to read entire press release.

MPHI's Annual Report wins national 2011 Aster Award for "Excellence in Medical Marketing"

Michigan Surpassing 48 States Shows Autos Drive US Economy

Nov. 2 (Bloomberg) -- Michigan’s economy is recovering from the recession at the second-fastest pace in the U.S., lifted by reviving carmakers and local manufacturers, according to a new Bloomberg index that tracks the pace of state growth.

The home to the U.S. automobile industry was topped only by North Dakota, where an oil boom is raising incomes and boosting government coffers at the nation’s quickest rate. California, Massachusetts and Illinois round out the top five in the Bloomberg Economic Evaluation of States Index, which uses data on real estate, jobs, taxes and stock prices to gauge the growth rate in 50 states and the District of Columbia.

Click here to read the entire article.

National Center for the Review & Prevention of Child Deaths Releases Summer 2011 Newsletter

Click here to read the Summer 2011 Newsletter.

Foundations Can Drive Investments in Public Health Infrastructure

Investing in our public health infrastructure saves lives.

That’s the bottom-line message of a recent Health Affairs article entitled Evidence Links Increases in Public Health Spending to Declines in Preventable Deaths. Its authors lay out the most compelling case possible for more public health spending. People are alive and healthy today who would not be if money had not been put into public health in the past twenty years.

Click here to read the full article.

MPHI Announces Healthy Food Drive

The Michigan Public Health Institute (“MPHI”) will host a healthy food drive to benefit the Greater Lansing Food Bank (“GLFB”). The food drive will begin Monday, August 15, 2011, and run through Friday, September 2, 2011.

The Greater Lansing Food Bank has been hit with difficulties lately. Their walk-in freezer quit during our recent heat-wave which requires repair costs around $30,000, the generator needs to be repaired, catalytic converters were stolen off their trucks in the spring, and earlier this week a lightning strike caused power outages near the Lansing facility. During the outage, seven tires disappeared from two of the food bank's refrigerated and freezer trucks. Add this to our tough economic situation and it all adds up to great need in our community. I'm hoping I can count on MPHI to help meet some of that need.

The Greater Lansing Food Bank is a non-profit organization that provides emergency food to individuals and families in need in Ingham, Eaton, and Clinton counties. Food is distributed through an extensive network of food pantries and community kitchens located throughout the greater Lansing area. The Food Bank annually serves tens of thousands of people, many of them seniors and children. Our recipients also include the “working poor,” those individuals who are employed but don’t earn enough to meet housing, health, transportation, and food needs.

Click here to read the entire Press Release

MPHI named as foundation intermediary for the Michigan Convergence Partnership aimed at promoting healthy people and healthy places

Click here to read Convergence Partnership: Healthy People, Healthy Places.

MPHI's Teri Covington testifies to Congress on Child Deaths Due to Maltreatments

MPHI's Teri Covington, Senior Program Director of the National Resource Center for Child Death Review testified in front of the Committee on Ways and Means Subcommittee on Human Resources, U.S. House of Representatives, on July 12, 2011.

Click here to read Teri Covington's full testimony.

Click here to read Child Maltreatment: Strengthening National Data on Child Fatalities Could Aid in Prevention

Child Deaths in Michigan 2007 - 2008

The report on Child Deaths in Michigan 2007-2008 (Click here to view report) was released this past Friday by the Department of Human Services. In this two-year period 3,121 children died in Michigan. While the number falls each year, local review teams believe half of these deaths could have been prevented through different actions by parents or other caregivers, less risky behaviors by adolescents and/or earlier intervention taken by public support teams. MPHI’s Center for Children and Families coordinates the work of local review teams, maintains the statewide data reporting system, and compiled information for this report. Please contact Shannon Stotenbur-Wing, Project Director for further information at 517.324-7353 or swing@mphi.org.

MPHI Awarded Five-Year, $4.5 Million Federal Grant

MPHI Participates in Race for the Cure

Thanks to all of the runners, walkers, and donors that made Team MPHI's participation in the Susan G. Komen "Race for the Cure" a big success. I am very proud of everyone. We finished strong and exceeded expectations.

The team had 40 members register to walk or run, and I think almost all of us actually made it to the finish line on a very cold and windy day. The team raised $1,625 in donations, which put us in 3rd place among businesses with 101-500 employees.

Six of us were among the more than 1,200 competitively timed runners. We all finished in the top half of the pack. Amy Stagg was our top finisher, placing 103rd in 22:45. Our ladies were awesome, placing 4th and 5th in the under 14 division and 2nd and 5th in the 40-44 division. Congratulations and many thanks to all!

Jeffrey Weihl, Team Captain

A Day Out with Habitat for Humanity

Consistent with MPHI’s goal to serve the local community, on April 20, 2011, the staff of the Center for Healthy Communities at MPHI had the opportunity to volunteer with Habitat for Humanity of Lansing. While staff were there to help create a safe, decent, and affordable home for a deserving family in the Lansing area, staff also had a lot of fun in the process! MPHI staff spent a full day on-site at one of the Habitat homes in Lansing, performing manual labor, including the priming and painting of the three bedrooms and painting the ceiling of the entire house. Staff were provided leadership and guidance by Charlie, Habitat builder. Following a brief orientation to the work of the organization and what has been accomplished so far in the Lansing area, staff were given instructions and training on the proper techniques and then were put right to work! Everyone contributed and got their hands dirty. It was not glorious work, but it was very rewarding. It is amazing what a small group of people can do when they put their minds to it.