McLeod Health Foundation, based in Florence, South Carolina, received funding for the McLeod Health Nurse-Family Partnership, a national community health program that empowers first-time, low-income mothers to successfully change their lives and the lives of their children through evidence-based nurse home visiting. Launched in South Carolina in 2008, McLeod implemented the Family-Nurse Partnership program in 2014, serving several counties and later expanded to additional counties.  

The CCME Foundation provided a $48,077 grant to maintain these services during a gap funding year within Marion County, an extremely rural and largely impoverished community, which severely impedes residents’ access to preventative health care and specifically prenatal care. There are no OBGYNs and only two pediatric doctors. There is also a lack of resources and jobs, and often clients must travel significant distances to be able to work. Because of the lack of childcare available, many young mothers must stay at home, and sometimes, this includes their babies and younger siblings in multi-generational families. The nurse home visitor must look at the entire family unit involved in each case and connect everyone to the available resources within the community, such as food pantries, WIC sign-up, and food stamps. They even connect the fathers to healthy male-centric programs for men.  

Marion County has a disproportionately high number of mothers who are first-time, low-income, with teen and single mothers making up a large portion of the client population. Teen birth rates are at 41% in Marion County, compared to 13.9% nationwide. With 38% of mothers receiving inadequate access to prenatal care, and an infant mortality rate of 14.2%, Marion County has also struggled with other challenging birth outcomes. The Family Nurse Partnership consistently addresses the needs of this population and has 45 years of research showing significant improvement in the health of these mothers and their children.  

Nurses begin working in the early stages of pregnancy with eligible mothers and continue until the child turns 2 years old. In addition to working with the nurse home visitor, mothers attend prenatal and postnatal appointments, receive nutrition and healthy weight guidance, attend well-child visits, with babies receiving developmental screening to ensure milestones are being met. If not, mothers receive referrals for early intervention services to give their babies the best care. The program also focuses on improving identification of the challenges related to maternal mental health and child development. With 48% of children living in economic poverty in Marion County, the program supports mothers in attaining employment or enrollment in school, so they can become economically self-sufficient.  

Emily Atkinson, the nurse for Marion County, shared a testimonial from one of her mothers, who lost her baby after just over a month when he was born prematurely. “Emily was always there day or night. Everything was going good until I got to 16-20 weeks when everything started spiraling downhill…I can honestly say that Emily never stopped worrying about us or checking on us. Till this day NFP still cares and are checking in on us after everything we’ve been through. I think more new mothers should be in this program and I am truly blessed to be able to be back in the program with my new baby.” Jennifer Turner, the project director, stated, “The secret sauce of the Nurse-Family Partnership is the relationship and trust built with the clients. They have to know that you’re not there just because it’s your job.” 

Learn more about the work of the McLeod Health Nurse-Family Partnership.