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FOGS Partners with March of Dimes for National Prematurity Campaign

On January 30, 2003, The March of Dimes launched a five-year campaign to increase awareness of the growing problem of premature birth in the United States and to decrease occurrence rates. In 2001, more than 476,000 babies — nearly 12 percent of live births — were preterm. The Prematurity Campaign will invest $75 million over the next five years and will raise new funds to support research into the prevention of preterm birth. The campaign will also advocate an increase of $10 million annually in federally funded research into the causes of premature birth. In February, the March of Dimes Florida Chapter held a "Prematurity Summit" to kick off their campaign. Top leaders in the field of maternal and child health came together to define the problem in the state, discuss interventions and programs, and seek innovative approaches to reduce risks that contribute to premature birth. Charles S. Mahan, M.D., Program Director/Professor of Maternal & Child Health Policy & External Constituencies of The Lawton & Rhea Chiles Center for Healthy Mothers & Babies, accepted the Chairman position of the Florida Prematurity Summit and agreed to lead the state’s Prematurity Campaign for the March of Dimes.

The Florida Obstetric and Gynecologic Society (FOGS) has joined the national professional Campaign Partners (The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG), and the Association of Women’s Health, Obstetric and Neonatal Nurses (AWHONN)) to move local strategies forward in Florida. In addition, more than 25 professional, consumer and government organizations across the U.S. have signed on to assist in communicating the campaign’s message to pregnant women, health care professionals and the public.

"Premature births are a major public health problem and the leading problem faced by practicing obstetricians," said Charles J. Lockwood, MD, speaking at the January public kickoff of the campaign. An expert on high-risk pregnancies, Dr. Lockwood is the Anita O’Keefe Young Professor and Chair of Yale University’s ob-gyn department, and a member of the March of Dimes Scientific Advisory Committee on Prematurity.

In a survey conducted in 2001 only 35% of the general public believed that prematurity is a serious problem. Yet 1 in 8 babies in the U.S. is born prematurely, before 37 completed weeks of gestation. Since the annual hospital charges for premature infants in the US in 2000 was estimated to be $11.9 billion (which was almost half of all hospital costs associated with care of newborns), it is clearly a serious fiscal problem. Although physicians are well aware of long-term complications of prematurity such as cerebral palsy, visual loss, chronic lung disease and other neurological handicaps, many lay people feel that with recent advances in neonatal care, preemies are not at risk for significant health problems.

The goals of the campaign are ambitious – to increase public awareness of the problem of prematurity from 35 to 60 percent, and to decrease the rate of preterm birth by at least 15 percent, to no more than 10.1 percent in 2007.

FOGS members can help in achieving the five aims of the campaign:

• Raising public awareness of the problem of prematurity.
• Assisting health care practitioners to improve prematurity risk detection and address riskassociated factors.
• Investing more public and private research dollars to identify causes of preterm labor and premature birth and to identify and test promising interventions.
• Expanding access to health insurance to improve prenatal care and infant health outcomes.
• Educating pregnant women and their families to recognize the signs of preterm labor; supporting parents of babies in NICUs.

The campaign will provide informational and educational resources to health care providers and will roll these out over the course of the initiative. To find out what resources are available, log on to www.marchofdimes.com. Click on National Campaign: Prematurity and then click the Professionals & Researchers tab. You’ll find a complete resource library, continuing education opportunities and information you can print out for your patients. Be sure to check back often, as information will be updated frequently. If you are interested in volunteering or finding out more about the Campaign locally, please contact the State Program Director, Lori Reeves, at 407-599-5077 or by email at Lreeves@marchofdimes.com.