Perinatal Pilot

About

The second pilot that we designed in late 2020 serves low-income pregnant women served by West County Health Centers and Santa Rosa Community Health. There is a growing body of published research indicating that improved access to healthy food during pregnancy can result in statistically significant improvements in healthy births and a reduction in expensive birth complications. As a result, support during pregnancy provides a unique opportunity for plans to invest in an intervention that is cost-effective in the short term while potentially providing important long-term health benefits to both babies and families.

Patients

All participants are part of the Comprehensive Perinatal Services Program, a MediCal benefit that provides perinatal services including some nutrition education and unlimited lactation consulting post-partum.

Intervention

The intervention included 4 weeks of 7 meals/week for everyone in the family, then a transition to a weekly produce bag until birth. Post-partum, participants received another 4 weeks of 7 meals/week for everyone in the family.

Partners

  • West County Health Centers

  • Santa Rosa Community Health

Funding

In 2022, Ceres secured $495,000 in funding from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Insecurity Nutrition Incentive grant program to scale this pilot to 240 women over the next three years. The funding also supports a more robust program evaluation protocol. Our eventual goal is to have Partnership HealthPlan fund the intervention for their members who are at higher risk of birth complications due to food insecurity, diabetes or other risk factors.

Results

Early results, based on about sixty participants, showed the following:

While the sample size is still small, we are already seeing positive impacts for participants.

  • 62% report an increase in vegetable consumption

  • 23% report a reduction in the experience of being food insecure

  • 92% say that the service helped them recover more quickly after birth, that it reduced stress because they didn’t have to shop or cook, and that they saved money

  • 85% said they ate more because the meals tasted good, they felt cared for by the community, and that the meals helped them feel better

  • 69% said the meals helped them change their eating habits, and 62% that they learned a lot about healthy eating

The overall rating of the service was extremely high:

  • 100% of participants rated the amount of food, portion sizes, variety of food, and the presentation/visual appeal of the food as good, very good, or excellent.

  • 100% rated the overall service a 4 or 5 out of 5

  • 92% rated “I would recommend Ceres to a friend of colleague” a 9 or 10 out of 10.