Analytics Identify Risks, Prevent Infant Deaths

By Katie Wike, contributing writer

In Indiana, one project is using data analytics to identify at-risk populations for infant mortality and work to lower those rates.

Using data analytics, a team in Indiana was able to make the connection between number of prenatal visits and the above average infant mortality rate in the state. The national average infant mortality rate declined 12 percent from 2005 through 2011, although the report indicates Indiana was among the states the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention classified as showing “no significant change” during that time.

Because of this statistic, the Indiana Governor's office, State Office of Technology, and State Office of Management and Budget collaborated to find the cause. According to iHealth Beat, the report is part of a larger initiative, the Management and Performance Hub, which is a platform for the centralized sharing of data and data analysis.

Researchers analyzed “17 integrated data sets created from four public sources and five state agencies,” including information pertaining to, criminal history, demographics, financial situations, maltreatment history, and other information on infant and maternal health.

Government Technology reports data analytics were used to analyze data from all infant mortality cases as well as the cases of infants with adverse health outcomes - including preterm infants and those with low birth weights.

“It's not only the infant deaths that we want to attack,” said Cris Johnston, practice director for organizational improvement at KSM Consulting, “but there's also a cost factor in treating the babies that were born and live that still have these health problems.”

Indiana CIO Paul Baltzell explains that early in their research, they found Medicaid data was the jackpot of information. They discovered that mothers 15 to 20 years of age and those enrolled in Medicaid have a higher risk of poor outcomes for their infants.

After they determined that prenatal visits were a factor, they discovered that one of the common reasons mothers didn’t attend their appointments was because they didn’t have a ride. This inspired the state to help connect mothers with public transportation.

“That's one of the simple things we were like, 'Wow,'“ Baltzell said. “In some cases, it's just a matter of getting the mother to the appointment.”