A Zip Code Should Not Determine a Child’s Health

Severely impoverished neighborhoods often exhibit “neighborhood effects syndrome,” characterized by symptoms such as blight, housing insecurity, racial segregation, trauma, violence, poorly performing schools, environmental toxins, and low social cohesion and support.

As a result, extreme poverty and its associated effects have debilitating consequences on the health and well-being of children and their families.

While the Affordable Care Act of 2010 required not-for-profit institutions to re-invest in their local communities through a comprehensive needs assessment and intervention plan, Nationwide Children’s Hospital was already focusing on how neighborhood effects were influencing child health, as well as how to deliver value-added care to Medicaid-eligible children.

In a novel approach to improving outcomes for children, Nationwide Children’s leaders and community partners decided to address the neighborhood effect syndrome as a target for pediatric health care – in effect, treating the neighborhood as a patient. In 2008, Nationwide Children’s began collaborating with residents, government entities and social services agencies to develop the Healthy Neighborhoods Healthy Families (HNHF) initiative.

This paper, available for download at ModernHealthcare.com/Perspectives_NCH, describes the program, results to date, lessons learned, and further reading related to how this initiative has positively impacted a neighborhood community, targeting improved child and family well-being.

“The most recent data on the program showed that quality of care improved for Partners for Kids patients.”