WIC Helps Prevent Premature Births

One of those programs is the WIC Offers Wellness (WOW) demonstration project based at the Avenue 43 WIC Center in Los Angeles. A partnership between PHFE-WIC (Women, Infants and Children supplemental nutrition program) and the March of Dimes, the WOW project focuses on helping high-risk mothers — usually mothers who have recently delivered a preterm and/or low birth weight baby — maximize their chances for future healthy, full-term pregnancies. Now in its second year of a three-year grant, the project offers health assessments, referrals to family planning, psychosocial intervention services and overall care coordination.

Statistics show that mothers visit WIC through multiple pregnancies, and WIC is one of very few services that low-income mothers access at least four times a year. This provides WOW an excellent opportunity to intervene with inter-conception care services.

To expand outreach beyond the Avenue 43 WIC Center, PHFE-WIC partnered with March of Dimes to host "Before, Between & Beyond Pregnancy," a workshop recently held at the California Endowment for more than 170 WIC professional staff from the nearly 50 PHFE-WIC centers in the county. Preconception care expert Dr. Michael Lu, also an associate professor of OB/GYN and the School of Public Health at UCLA, was guest speaker.

"The WIC Program has an incredible opportunity to promote preconception health among a very large population of postpartum mothers, as well as (to) reduce rates of poor birth outcomes," said Denise Gee, special projects manager for PHFE-WIC.

To learn more about the WOW Program and inter-conception care at PHFE-WIC, contact Denise Gee at denise@phfewic.org. For more about PHFE-WIC and March of Dimes, please visit www.phfewic.org or www.marchofdimes.com.

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