PRAMS Special Projects

Kellogg Foundation Project

In 2011, the Pregnancy Risk Assessment Monitoring System (PRAMS) began working with the W.K. Kellogg Foundation (WKKF) to enhance the existing PRAMS surveillance systems in four states—Louisiana, Michigan, Mississippi, and New Mexico. Within each state, the PRAMS Project expanded the data collection to take into account specific areas (i.e., counties and Orleans Parish in Louisiana). Each of these states is developing alternative outreach strategies to reach women in these areas. These strategies include distributing and collecting survey questionnaires, making prompt calls, or sending text messages to reach women before giving them the survey. The data collected by this effort will be used to assess program outreach, and develop sampling and outreach methods to reach women who are traditionally less likely to respond to mail or phone surveys. These enhancements will assist the W.K. Kellogg Foundation in assessing the effectiveness of their programs to promote maternal and infant health among low-income and minority populations. The project will be completed in 2015.

Tribal Flu Project

The PRAMS Tribal Flu Project was a 2-year initiative with the goal of disseminating representative data from American Indian (AI) mothers about their perceptions of and experiences with H1N1 and seasonal influenza. Three states—New Mexico, Oregon, and Washington—were funded to conduct this project from 2011–2013. Funded state health departments were charged with adapting their PRAMS-related epidemiologic and managerial support to work collaboratively with tribes in a manner respecting tribal sovereignty, with the ultimate project goal to establish or improve partnerships with tribes, increase response rates among AI women, and increase data sharing with tribes.

As of 2014, the three funded states initiated or enhanced ongoing partnerships with tribes or tribal organizations within their states. New Mexico PRAMS partnered with the Albuquerque Area Tribal Epidemiology Center (TEC), the Navajo Epidemiology Center, Tribal WIC Directors, and the Navajo area PRAMS to hire a permanent tribal liaison dedicated to maternal and child health issues. Washington partnered with the American Indian Health Commission, Northwest Portland Area Indian Health Board, and Seattle Indian Health Board to promote PRAMS and share influenza materials with tribes throughout the state. Interest and activities spread to other states, including a request from a North Carolina tribe to share the State of Washington’s printed influenza materials, and three states—Alaska, Michigan, and Wyoming— significantly enhanced their PRAMS outreach to tribal communities without additional funding from CDC.

Teen Oversample Project

The PRAMS teen oversample project is a 3-year initiative designed to gather more information and insight into sexual behaviors, attitudes, and contraceptive use among teens who have had a live born infant to address teen pregnancy prevention efforts. Understanding the experiences of teen mothers can provide insight to guide program and policy strategies to prevent repeat pregnancies among teen parents, as well as first pregnancies among teens. Two states—Mississippi and New York—were funded to conduct this oversample from 2011–2014. In addition to sampling more teens, activities included adding teen-specific questions to the PRAMS survey and experimenting with different incentives and rewards to increase teens’ participation in PRAMS. Data collection will end in 2014, at which point analysis and dissemination of findings will occur.