Institute for Families in Society

Child, Youth, and Family Research Integrated Health and Policy Research Early Childhood Research

News Highlights

Institute for Families in Society (IFS) Wins Film Award

A short film produced by the Institute for Families in Society (IFS) tied for first place at the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology’s ACOG-District IV Annual Meeting. The film, under the broader initiative Voices|Voces, was created as a discussion tool on maternal healthcare for educating and training healthcare professionals and the greater community at-large.

The winning video, titled "I've Got You - Maternal Mortality," is part of the larger project focused on elevating the voices and experiences of South Carolina Black and Latinx women, recent immigrant women facing low-income challenges and women relying on Medicaid for pregnancy, birthing and postpartum-related costs.

Using Theater as a Mechanism for Change

Voices|Voces: Moving Forward through Women's Voices to Address Pregnancy and Birth Inequities is a research-based theatrical performance built on interviews with women using Medicaid for pregnancy and birthing-related care. The Institute for Families in Society (IFS) at the University of SC (USC) funded the development of this theatrical performance to ensure broad dissemination and utilization of the results of this study.

Theater offers a powerful method for dissemination complex information to diverse audiences - a tool for translating research into practice and meaningful messages to affect change. A USC-based playwright crafted a performance in which five actors represent women who participated in the interviews. They speak the actual words shared through interviews conducted from 2020-2021.

The full series of performances can be viewed on IFS's YouTube Channel.

📢 New Publication 📢

Congenital syphilis can cause severe morbidity, including miscarriage and stillbirth. Although preventable with early detection, rates are increasing rapidly within the U.S. Research Professor and Associate Director, Dr. Ana Lopez-De Fede, led IHPR’s collaboration with colleagues at AcademyHealth, and in Kentucky and Louisiana to conduct an analysis examining associations between the odds of prenatal syphilis screening and sexually transmitted infection history or other patient characteristics across 3 states with elevated rates of congenital syphilis. Learn more about this study, its findings and implications in the recently published article in the Journal of the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology.

📢 New Publication 📢

Featured in the latest issue of Esri's ArcNews magazine, IFS showcases the latest innovation of its GeoEScan^© with the first release of a web-based product for the Children's Health and Resource Geographic Exploration for Data-Driven Decisions (CHARGED³) project, funded by The Duke Endowment. Read the article in the Spring 2023 issue here.

2023 Smith Scholarship Recipient

Sarai Deese, a dual major Psychology BS and Public Health BA student in the Honors college, has been awarded the Smith Scholarship Award for the year 2023. Please join us in congratulating her on this award.

2021 Billingsley Faculty Award Recipient

Dr. Bobby Donaldson, an Associate Professor of History and the Director of the Center for Civil Rights History and Research at the University of South Carolina-Columbia was recently awarded the Billingsley Faculty Award for the year 2021.

VOICES/VOCES

VOICES/VOCES is a play in Spanish and English based on interviews conducted with women throughout South Carolina who were covered by Medicaid for pregnancy, delivery, and postpartum care. This creative work, funded by the IFS, elevates women’s voices and demonstrates the importance of including women and consumers in shaping responsive and culturally sensitive health care systems. Achieving equitable health care requires including diverse voices in the discussions and decision-making processes that ultimately define policies and programs. The original research was conducted under contract with SC Healthy Connections Medicaid in support of the SC Birth Outcomes Initiative to better understand pregnancy and birth inequities in the context of COVID-19 among women who rely on Medicaid/Emergency Medicaid for their pregnancy-related care. The main findings for that study are summarized in the VOICES/VOCES report available by clicking HERE.

The VOICES/VOCES had a live theatre performance on October 21 and 22, 2021.

Launching CHARGED³ Hub

With Duke Endowment funding, through the project CHARGED³, IFS has launched a resource hub focused on SC’s youngest. The hub showcases the latest Geospatial Environmental Scan^© developed by IFS—an interactive research tool designed to explore geographic gaps and patterns in access to children’s health care and available resource programs.

Donabedian Public Health Award

Dr. Ana Lòpez-De Fede from the college's Institute for Families in Society was recently recognized for her efforts to quality assurance and improvements in health care.

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