Improving State Health Agency Capacity to Address Substance Use, Mental, and Behavioral Health Needs of Maternal & Child Populations

Full Description: The Association of State & Territorial Health Officials (ASTHO) is a membership association dedicated to supporting state and territorial health agencies (S/THAs) and their leadership to strengthen and improve the public’s health. As an organization dedicated to evidence-informed public health practice, we utilize an implementation science framework to continually assess, improve, and apply lessons learned. Two examples of how ASTHO achieves this are the Promoting Innovation in State and Territorial MCH Policymaking (PRISM) Learning Community, and the Suicide, Overdose, and Adverse Childhood Experiences Prevention Capacity Assessment Tool (SPACECAT).

This poster presentation uses the example of maternal and child populations impacted by substance use disorder and mental and behavioral health needs to demonstrate how ASTHO leverages the SPACECAT and PRISM projects to develop and maintain a synergistic understanding of and response to the issue. Since women are at the highest risk of developing substance use disorder (SUD) during their reproductive years, treating maternal substance misuse and mental/behavioral health concerns is an important state/territorial strategy to improve birth outcomes for women who are or may become pregnant. To learn more about state/territorial efforts to support these populations and address these issues, ASTHO, with support from CDC, launched SPACECAT, which is an online self-assessment tool to assist health agencies, ASTHO, CDC, and the National Association of City & County Health Officials (NACCHO) in better understanding the impacts of COVID-19 on the capacity to address shared risk and protective factors for suicide, overdose, and adverse childhood experiences (ACEs).

Information gathering and analysis is only one part of how ASTHO serves its members and improves public health outcomes. A primary vehicle through which ASTHO engages and supports S/THAs is through the organization and implementation of learning communities of practice. One such learning community is PRISM, which is dedicated to support S/THAs in innovative policy approaches to improving substance use and mental/behavioral health outcomes for women, children, and their families. Made possible by the Health Resources & Services Administration (HRSA) and close partnership with the Association of Maternal & Child Health Programs (AMCHP), PRISM achieves its goals through several key activities, including supported action planning, policy academies, regular virtual learning sessions, presentations and support from subject matter experts, peer-to peer learning and networking, and stakeholder engagement.

ASTHO’s lifecycle approach to surveillance, analysis, dissemination, and practice is a strong example of translating evidence into action. Building on the successes of SPACECAT and PRISM, ASTHO’s next steps include developing national and regional reports, a webinar, an infographic, and a capacity building toolkit with SPACECAT findings. Health agencies that participated in the SPACECAT will also be invited to attend a Peer-to-Peer Convening to connect, learn tips and tricks for communicating internally and externally within their agencies, how to best utilize their survey results, and be provided with a competency toolkit to guide their agency’s next steps. ASTHO is also continuing its close partnership with AMCHP and supporting a forthcoming supplement on perinatal substance use (to be published in the Maternal & Child Health Journal), as well as host a policy academy to support S/THAs in drafting and improving state-level policies to improve MCH/SUD outcomes.