Morgan State University Maternal Health Equity Research Coordinating Center (MSU CC)

Over the past several decades maternal mortality in the United States (U.S.) has increased from 7.2 in 1987 to 32.9 in 2021 4.5 times higher with black women experiencing 2-3 times more deaths. There are many factors driving these disparities: social determinants of health and inadequate participation of Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs) that have a demonstrated record/historical commitment to serving underrepresented students and their communities. These barriers require a different approach as identified in the White House Blueprint for Addressing the Maternal Health Crisis. This five-year Project has four goals: Establish a Coordinating Center (CC) to develop Maternal Health Research capacity of 16 multi-institutional research centers (RCs) [the Collaborative] that will form a network of MSIs. Engage early-stage investigators in the RCs to build capacity to conduct community engaged problem-solving research addressing disparities in Maternal mortality Severe maternal morbidity Maternal health outcomes. Collect data to measure and evaluate the Collaborative's productivity efficiency impact and effectiveness. Create and disseminate curricula on the impact of climate change on maternal health disparities. Methods: Year 1: Conduct needs assessment of Collaborative and develop individualized strategic action plans. Develop/ implement training/mentoring program (>45% of budget annually) with four elements: 1) Community engagement science 2) research methods grantsmanship/publishing 3) data acquisition analysis/management systems and 4) maternal health policy analysis. Assess/deploy existing appropriate materials in each content area where four post-doctoral fellows will conduct research. The Association of Public Health Nutrition will provide 20 fellows/ proctors to help facilitate co-learning and co-development using bi-directional communication. Six community/ youth part-time staff will inform all aspects of this project. Each of the 16 MSIs will have early-stage investigators in the learning community. Year 2: Apply community engagement science to empower communities to collaborate in identifying/developing research solutions. Year 3: Develop pilot studies. Use findings to for grant applications to seek funding using the CDC Knowledge to Action Framework. Year 4 & 5: Implement research/publish. Create/disseminate curricula on impact of climate change on maternal health disparities.

Products:

Maternal health equity website training materials webinars workshops conferences seminars tools and toolkits. Evaluation will be comprehensive/ongoing using process measures collected to monitor/report progress towards four objectives. Common data elements will be identified using common core of essential process/implementation/ outcome measures to lay foundation for data standardization/linkage ensuring that data is aggregated/ compared across sites. Multiple mixed method data collection strategies/systems designed to be both meaningful and feasible will be used. Outcome measures will be collected to document impact of the four primary goals including impact of network on policies programs/practices.