National Screening Initiatives

The items listed below are programs and initiatives focused around the topic of developmental surveillance and screening throughout the United States

Assuring Better Child Health and Development (ABCD) Program
This program was designed to assist states in improving the delivery of early child development services for low-income children and their families. The Screening Academy was based off of the Assuring Better Child Health and Development (ABCD) Program, also funded by Commonwealth Fund and administered by NASHP. 

The first ABCD Consortium (ABCD 1) was created in 2000 and provided grants to four states (NC, UT, VT, WA) to develop or expand service delivery and financing strategies aimed at enhancing healthy child development for low-income children and their families. The program concluded in 2003. The ABCD 2 Initiative, launched in 2003, was designed to assist states in building the capacity of Medicaid programs to deliver care that supports children’s healthy mental development. The initiative is funding the work of five states (CA, IL, IA, MN, UT).

Bright Futures Training Intervention (BFTI) with Office Staff to Improve Preventive and Developmental Services in Practices
The BFTI aims to develop and identify specific strategies and tools to enable a variety of practices to implement Bright Futures approaches that will enhance the delivery of preventive and developmental services to children younger than five years. Fifteen practices were involved in a yearlong pilot test of a curriculum and systems change toolkit aimed at applying a Bright Futures framework to preventive and developmental services. The pilot framework, made up of quality improvement systems approaches, consists of the following six components: use of preventive services summary sheet; use of structured developmental screening tools; evaluation of parental strengths, involvement and needs including assessment of protective factors; use of a recall and reminder system; community resource linkage; and identification of children with special health care needs.

Developmental Surveillance and Screening Policy Implementation Project (D-PIP)
The D-PIP selected 17 primary care pediatric practices from around the country (representing private practice, community based health centers, and residency programs) to implement the AAP policy statement “Identifying Infants and Young Children with Developmental Disorders in the Medical Home: An Algorithm for Developmental Surveillance and Screening” and determine if the algorithm can be implemented into pediatric practice, recognize strategies for implementing the algorithm, and examine outcomes of implementing the algorithm.

The goal of this project is to increase the frequency of screening for developmental concerns in pediatric practices. Early identification of developmental concerns, followed by appropriate referral and intervention aims to improve child development outcomes. Through the data collected in the D-PIP, effort is being undertaken to determine how the AAP algorithm is being implemented, with the goal of generating recommendations for replication in other clinical practices.

States that have D-PIP practices include: CA (2), CT (2), GA, IL, IN, MI, MN, MT, NE, OH, OK, PA, TX, VA, WV.

Healthy Development Learning Collaborative
The goal of the Healthy Development Learning Collaborative is to improve preventive and developmental care for children up to five years of age.  The Healthy Development Collaborative supports primary care practices in engaging families in a partnership that meets the families’ need to promote positive developmental and psychosocial outcomes for their children.

Goals for practices participating in the Collaborative include parents receiving age-appropriate anticipatory guidance and parent education, children receiving age-appropriate developmental screenings, children and families being screened for psychosocial strengths and needs, and children identified “at risk” for developmental delays receiving additional care.

This project is funded by The Commonwealth Fund and the Vermont Department of Health, and is a joint project between the Vermont Child Health Improvement Program and The Center for Children’s Healthcare Improvement in North Carolina.  Eight Vermont practices and 10 North Carolina practices are participating.

Healthy Steps for Young Children
CDC is working with Swope Health Services of Kansas City, Missouri, to implement the Healthy Steps for Young Children pediatric practice model in Swope’s pediatric clinic. The model will be assessed for its effectiveness in increasing the number of children who receive Early and Periodic Screening, Diagnosis, and Treatment (EPSDT) services, and developmental screening in particular, to ensure that their physical and psychosocial developmental needs are being met.

Healthy Steps for Young Children (Healthy Steps) is a national initiative that focuses on the importance of the first three years of life. Healthy Steps emphasizes a close relationship between health care professionals and parents in addressing the physical, emotional, and intellectual growth and development of children from birth to age three.

Each Healthy Steps team includes a Healthy Steps Specialist, who enhances the information and services available to parents. The Healthy Steps Specialist can be a new team member or a nurse, child development specialist, or social worker already working in the practice. The Specialists have training in child development and address major behavioral and developmental issues, focusing on a whole baby, whole family brand of primary care.

The Healthy Steps approach is being implemented in pediatric and family practices across the country and is meeting an array of community needs while preserving its unique linkage to a team of health care professionals. States with Healthy Steps sites include: AZ, CA, CO, FL, GA, IL, KS, MA, MI, MS, MO, NY, NC, OH, OK, PA, TX.

National Academy for State Health Policy ABCD Screening Academy
The ABCD Screening Academy is a 15-month project with the goal of accomplishing wide-spread adoption of policies and practices that can move the use of a standardized developmental screening tool from a ‘best practice’ to a ‘standard practice.' The ABCD Screening Academy will bring together state teams composed of multiple state agencies, practitioners, and other stakeholders to form public/private partnerships to develop, implement, and spread strategies for improving screening that best fit each states health care delivery system. Medicaid is the lead agency for the Screening Academy. The jurisdictions selected for the Screening Academy are: AK, AL, AR, CA, CT, DE, DC, KA, MD, MA, MI, MN, MT, NJ, NY , OH, OR, PR, VA, and WI.

Vermont Child Health Improvement Program (VCHIP)
VCHIP supports clinicians in their efforts to improve care by providing a centralized resource for quality improvement. With Fund support, VCHIP is helping five other regions develop improvement partnerships among state Medicaid programs, public health agencies, and local professional organizations. The improvement partnerships—in Kings County, Washington, Washington, DC, and the states of Arizona, New York, and Rhode Island—will initially focus on strengthening the quality of developmental and preventive services for young children. In phase two, project staff will bring this quality improvement model to five new states, create a learning community of the new and existing partnerships, and disseminate results nationwide. Phase Two of the Improvement Partnerships Initiative will continue the mission to build state and regional capacity for the improvement of health care for all children, specifically to enhance developmental screening and surveillance for young children. To date, five states/regions (RI, NY, WA, AZ, DC) selected during Phase I have successfully launched Improvement Partnership programs.