CHARLESTON, S.C. (WCSC) – A South Carolina-based organization is getting more resources to offer in-home care for new Lowcountry mothers.
Children’s Trust South Carolina funds agencies across the state that offer free home visits to help those in their early stages of motherhood prepare for what’s to come. Those programs are now receiving an extra $1 million in funding through the federal Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home Visiting Grant.
For the first time, the grant is offering a three-to-one money grant. The federal government will pitch in $750,000 and Children’s Trust South Carolina will match $250,000.
The Home Visiting programs use nurses, early childhood specialists and social workers as visitors to support family functions and child health and wellbeing. The state organization uses three program models: Healthy Families America, Nurse Family Partnership and Parents as Teachers. The models target family issues such as low-income parents or single mothers with goals of lowering abuse or maltreatment. The free programs work to increase parent-child interaction, wellbeing and school readiness.
Dr. Luke Edmonson, a pediatrician at MUSC Children’s Health in Moncks Corner, works closely with grant funding as the center partners with the trust. He says the home visiting programs target the early age group as major brain development happens in the first 1,000 days.
“If you can put that child on a positive trajectory… that is going to pay off benefits for the rest of their life,” he says. “It’s really hard to kind of put into words, like, how big of a difference it can make if you intervene early. As opposed to that child you only recognize there’s a problem, for example, when they start kindergarten. There’s not a whole lot you can do to change that trajectory sometimes.”
Edmondson says helping families and children be successful positively impacts the community in the long run.
“There’s so many things that they look at that this is an improvement,” Edmondson says. “If a family is able to get off of Medicaid and get private insurance because they get a better job or if they’re able to improve their housing condition. All these kinds of things have economic benefits to society as a whole that come from paying money into this program.”
Patients are able to join the free programs through referrals by medical staff.
Children’s Trust data shows 44 out of 46 counties across the state need available child outcome resources and services. But at the moment, that data shows only 10 percent of families are using the programs.
The organization wants to address awareness and access to home visiting in rural areas.
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