Strategies

Involve consumers in health care governance via roles on governing boards, advisory committees, or shorter-term special projects

Provide at-risk expectant parents and families with young children with information, support, and training regarding child health, development, and care from prenatal stages through early childhood via trained home visitors

Expand incentives such as scholarships and loans with service requirements and loan repayment or forgiveness programs for health care providers who practice in rural or other underserved areas

Teach parenting skills in a group setting using a standardized curriculum, often based on behavioral or cognitive-behavioral approaches and focused on parents of at-risk children

Increase patients’ health-related knowledge via efforts to simplify health education materials, improve patient-provider communication, and increase overall literacy

Provide home visiting services to families who are at risk for adverse childhood experiences, starting prenatally or right after birth and continuing for three to five years

Provide pregnant and parenting teens with services such as education, vocational training, case management, health care, child care, and transportation assistance to support high school completion

Expand use of J-1 physician visa waivers for foreign national physicians who have trained in the U.S. and will serve patients in designated Health Professional Shortage Areas (HPSAs)

Use regulation to extend nurse practitioners’ (NPs’) scope of practice to provide care to the full scope of their training and skills without physician oversight, especially for primary care

Provide home visiting services to low income, first time mothers and their babies, starting during pregnancy and continuing through a child’s second birthday