2020 Mom Founder and Executive Director Joy Burkhard to Serve as Expert Advisor for AHRQ Rural Postpartum Mental Health Challenge

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Washington, DC – In May, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) announced that Joy Burkhard, MBA was selected to serve as an expert advisor for their Cross-Sectional Innovation to Improve Rural Postpartum Mental Health Challenge.

The challenge aims to drive both proposal and narrative submissions, allowing the initiative to highlight success stories in rural postpartum mental health and encourage future innovative approaches.

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What We’re Reading

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What I’m reading this month not surprisingly focuses on how the pandemic is affecting mood and also what we might be able to do about it. Interestingly, the Federal Agency AHRQ is also now more aggressively recommending a standardized depression screening/measurement approach to allow for more compatibility and quality improvement efforts. As a health systems quality improvement practitioner, I also believe this is critical and controversial.

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Birth and the COVID Crisis – An Appeal to the CA Governor

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By Joy Burkhard, MBA

Today, 2020 Mom, along with nearly 25 co-signers, submitted the following letter to the Governor of California and the states Health and Human Services (HHS) agency to address the fears mothers have about giving birth alone, the fear of hospitals having bed shortages and the potential doctor and nursing shortages, and the need for mothers to know their non-hospital birth options. The letter also urges the state to ensure all mothers who screen positive for an MMH disorder have access to treatment.

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California COVID Peer Support + MMH Law

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Following are two pertinent updates regarding California’s response to the COVID crisis.

1. California’s New Peer Support Service is Available

The state’s newly enacted mental health peer telephone line and web-chat service is available to any California resident experiencing increased levels of anxiety and interested in connecting with a peer.

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What We’re Reading

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What a week it’s been!
Let me divert your attention just a bit from the news story of the day by sharing the non-COVID stories that recently caught my eye (ok I’m sharing one!).

Regarding the third article below, as a mom of a sleepless infant (and child), I can attest to the emotional troubles he has had (and are only getting worse now that he’s 12). 

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President Trump Signs the 2020 Budget, Including an MMH Report

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On December 20, 2019, President Trump signed the Budget bill averting a government shut-down and funding a Maternal Mental Health interagency Task Force. The Health and Human Services (HHS) Agency is tasked with convening a task force of various federal agencies including:

  • The Office of Women's Health,

  • The Surgeon General,

  • The Health Resources and Services Administration Maternal Child Health Bureau (HRSA), and the

  • Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) and more.

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What We’re Reading

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Here are the news articles covering clinical topics that caught my eye in the last two months. Note the focus on gut health and nutrition and the connection to depression. If you have had experiences as a patient or treating provider with any of these treatments please post your story in the comments below.

The Vagus Nerve May Carry Serotonin Along the Gut-Brain Axis

SSRIs may activate vagus nerve-dependent gut-to-brain serotonin signaling. Read more here.

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Celebrating 8 Years, Joy’s Reflections

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I’m writing this post, 8 years to the day of when I convened our first call with stakeholders (learn more about why this first call was held, and why I raised my hand to lead it, on the video at the top of our About 2020 Mom page.)

Recalling Our Journey

I heard over and over again that providers needed more training, and universal screening was a must. This made sense, though what I wanted to understand was why women weren’t already being screened, diagnosed and treated.

I began my quest for knowledge. I combed through research (which was difficult to consolidate, and often contradictory) and struggled to find answers.

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What We’re Reading

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Here are the articles that caught our founder Joy Burkhard’s eye in recent weeks. If you have had direct experience with the topic covered on any of these articles please share your insight by adding a comment below.

What It Feels Like To Be In Psychosis

I was diagnosed with bipolar I disorder with psychotic features when I was 25 years old. My mental health journey unraveled my life to the point where I nearly died. An entire year, spanning most of 2005, drove me entirely out of reality. It remains extremely difficult to explain how something called “psychosis” has affected my brain.

Most people understand psychosis to be seeing, hearing and believing things that are not real. Simple. However, it is not easy to explain what being in psychosis feels like...

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California’s Medicaid Program Now Reimburses Screening and Treatment to Prevent Maternal Depression

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In July 2019, the California Medicaid (Medi-Cal) Agency, Department of Health Care Services (DHCS) announced how it would support health plan compliance with the US Preventive Services Task Force assessment of sufficient evidence and recommendation to screen and treat to prevent maternal depression. Read more here.

Other states are likely developing similar positions to provide clarity to Medicaid health plans and screening and treating providers on how services should be billed and covered.

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Study Uncovers the Heavy Financial Toll of Untreated Maternal Mental Health Conditions

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Common and Costly Expenditures Associated with the Birth of Children in 2017 Amount to More than $14 Billion

If you ask people what they think the most common medical complication is during and after childbirth, you probably won’t hear mental health issues. Yet maternal mental health (MMH) disorders — including prenatal and postpartum depression and anxiety — top the list, affecting at least one in seven women. In addition to the substantial human toll of these conditions, they come with a hefty price tag, especially because women who have them often go untreated.

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What We Are Reading

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Below are the news articles that caught my eye this month. Use the comments feature below to share you thoughts with me.

AHRQ Stats: Depression Screening

Though the US Preventive Service Task Force has recommended depression screening in adults since 2009, fewer than half of all Americans ages 35 and older were screened for depression in 2015, according to the federal Agency for Health Care Research and Quality. Read it here.

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What We Are Reading

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Here are my favorite articles since I last shared “What I’m Reading.” Note, I’m eager to get your thoughts on any of these articles, but particularly interested in your opinions about the three articles at the bottom; are you having problems with insurers? Let us know in the comments below.

Pregnancy Specific Anxiety Impacts How Long Women Breastfeed

New research published in June links anxiety and breastfeeding, a link moms have long been sharing concerns about. Read it here.

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Standing Up for Maternal Health at Mom Congress 2019

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The United States has the worst maternal death rates of any developed country, with Black women dying at 3-4 times the rates of white women, this rate remains unchanged when accounting for income, education and economic status. Maternal death rates for women overall in the U.S. doubled in the past 25 years, meaning that women today have a higher risk of dying at childbirth than their mothers, and the disparities that Black women face have been around for decades. For every maternal death in the country, 70 women face a life-threatening and too often, life-altering complication.

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What is HEDIS and Why Should I Care?

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Have you ever wished that someone would monitor how often screening for maternal depression is happening and to report that rate?

It’s been a dream of mine to have such a measurement in place so we can gauge how quickly change is occurring, determine states where rates are highest/lowest, and push for more aggressive action until screening rates are in the acceptable 90% range nationally.  

Now, development of such a measure, referred to as a Healthcare Effectiveness Data and Information Set (“HEDIS”) measure, is underway thanks to The California Health Care Foundation and the ZOMA Foundation.  

In addition to a measure of screening, there is also a measure being developed to address whether the screening provider followed-up.  Here are the proposed measures - which include assessment for screening/follow-up during both pregnancy and the postpartum period. 

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