Matria Healthcare To Provide A Major National Health Plan With Expanded Continuum Of Maternity Care

Matria Healthcare, Inc., (NASDAQ: MATR) announced that it will expand its maternity services to a major national health plan by providing maternity risk assessment, member education and case management support services. When fully implemented, annualized revenues are expected to be in the range of $2.2 million.


Under the new terms, employers in the health plan's network will be able to use Matria's services to assist in the management of their employees' and members' pregnancy-related needs across the entire continuum of maternity care. The health plan network includes more than 4,200 hospitals, approximately 575,000 physician and ancillary providers nationally and provides health care coverage to more than 5,000 employers and over two million people.


"We look forward to building on our established relationship to deliver a more complete continuum of pregnancy care," said Gregg Raybuck, president of Women's and Children's Health at Matria. "It has been our experience that the earlier risk factors can be identified -- even before the pregnancy has occurred -- the better the clinical and financial outcomes for patients and healthcare providers."


Matria's expanded services to the client comprise a preconception education program, maternity risk screening, member education, case management of complicated cases and 24/7 access to highly experienced OB trained nurses. Matria currently provides the health plan with its comprehensive suite of home-based obstetrical services. Additionally, Matria provides a full suite of health enhancement programs and services, including wellness solutions and the management of chronic conditions.


"Matria's extensive national network of obstetrical RNs has vast experience in assisting physicians manage hundreds of thousands of complicated pregnancies with excellent clinical outcomes, while helping drive down costs," said Raybuck. "With the addition of these services, it is our aim to further improve clinical outcomes and increase overall member satisfaction in our expanded relationship."


According to Raybuck, the vital link to successful outcomes is how Matria's home-based obstetrical programs closely partner with healthcare providers to manage and monitor complicated pregnancy patients.


About Matria Healthcare


Matria Healthcare is a leading provider of integrated comprehensive health enhancement programs to health plans, employers and government agencies. Matria is dedicated to developing better educated, motivated and self-enabled healthcare consumers and supporting clinicians in managing the care of their patients. The Company manages major chronic diseases and episodic conditions including diabetes, congestive heart failure, coronary artery disease, asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, high-risk obstetrics, cancer, musculoskeletal and chronic pain, depression, obesity, and other conditions. Matria delivers programs that address wellness, healthy living, productivity improvement and navigation of the healthcare system, and provides case management of acute and catastrophic conditions. Headquartered in Marietta, Georgia, Matria operates through nearly 50 offices around the United States. More information about Matria can be found online at matria.















Safe Harbor Statement


This press release contains forward-looking statements. Such statements include but are not limited to the revenue expectations from the expanded relationship and the impact of the Company's maternity services on providing earlier risk identification, better pregnancy clinical and financial outcomes and increased member satisfaction. These statements are based on current information and belief, and are not guarantees of future performance. Among the important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those indicated by such forward-looking statements include failure to achieve the anticipated revenues, inability of the maternity services to provide earlier risk identification, better pregnancy outcomes and improved member satisfaction, developments in the healthcare industry, third-party actions over which Matria does not have control, regulatory requirements applicable to Matria's business and the risk factors detailed from time to time in Matria's periodic reports and registration statements filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including Matria's Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2007. By making these forward-looking statements, Matria does not undertake to update them in any manner except as may be required by Matria's disclosure obligations in filings it makes with the Securities and Exchange Commission under the federal securities laws.

Matria Healthcare

Some GOP Sens. Plan Campaign To Oppose CMS Nominee Berwick

Senate Republicans are increasing their opposition to President Obama's nominee for CMS administrator, Donald Berwick, and developing a campaign against him over what they claim is his support for rationing health care, CQ Today reports. According to CQ Today, Berwick is "widely regarded as an innovator in improving health care quality, but Republicans see his views as controversial" (Reichard, CQ Today, 4/21).

Berwick is a Harvard University professor and president and CEO of the Institute for Healthcare Improvement. If confirmed, he would lead the implementation of many of the health reform law's broad changes, including expanding Medicaid and controlling Medicare costs (Women's Health Policy Report, 4/20). The Senate Finance Committee will oversee Berwick's confirmation hearing, but no date has been set.

Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) on Wednesday said Berwick "has a history of support for government rationing of health care resources, … [n]ot on the grounds of quality, not on the grounds of survivability, but on the grounds of cost." Senate Finance Committee member Pat Roberts (R-Kan.) said that he likely will not support Berwick's nomination. Roberts said that Berwick "wrote two books on rationing" and helped the British implement their National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence, or NICE, which Roberts called an "acronym for their rationing system."

The Republican Policy Committee on Tuesday released a statement suggesting that U.S. residents might find Berwick's "desire to 'learn from and adapt' the British rationing system as troubling" and "indicative of Democrats’ government takeover of health care," according to CQ Today.

White House spokesperson Reid Cherlin said that "no one is surprised that Republicans plan to use this confirmation process to trot out the same arguments and scare tactics they hoped would block health insurance reform." He added, "The president is looking forward to [Berwick's] confirmation" (CQ Today, 4/21).


Reprinted with kind permission from nationalpartnership. You can view the entire Daily Women's Health Policy Report, search the archives, or sign up for email delivery here. The Daily Women's Health Policy Report is a free service of the National Partnership for Women & Families, published by The Advisory Board Company.


© 2010 The Advisory Board Company. All rights reserved.

Overweight Girls At Risk For Cardiovascular Disease

WHAT: New results from the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) Growth and Health Study suggest that girls as young as age 9 who are overweight are at increased risk for short-term and long-term problems that increase the chances of developing cardiovascular disease. More than 2,300 girls ages 9 and 10 were enrolled in the study and followed for more than 10 years. Researchers measured participants' height, weight, blood pressure, and cholesterol annually through age 18, and obtained self-reported measures at ages 21 to 23.



"Childhood Overweight and Cardiovascular Disease Risk Factors: The National Heart, Lung, And Blood Institute Growth and Health Study," will be published in the January issue of the Journal of Pediatrics. The study was funded by NHLBI, the National Institute of Mental Health, and the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, all components of the National Institutes of Health (NIH).



Researchers found that the girls were more than 1.6 times more likely to become overweight during ages 9 to 12 years than in later adolescence. Importantly, those who were overweight were more likely to have elevated blood pressure and cholesterol levels compared to girls who were not overweight. In addition, girls who were overweight during childhood were 11 to 30 times more likely than non-overweight girls to be obese in young adulthood (ages 21 to 23).



The study also provides insight into differences between African-American and Caucasian girls. Black girls were 1.5 times more likely to become overweight at any given age than white girls. In addition, from ages 9 through 18, the prevalence of overweight was greater among black girls (from 17 percent to 24 percent), compared to white girls (7 percent to 10 percent).



WHO: Karen Donato, program coordinator for We Can! and for NHLBI's Obesity Education Initiative, highlights the importance of helping children adopt behaviors to maintain a healthy weight and prevent overweight as early as ages 9 through 12. NIH has a national educational program for families and communities that addresses this need. Called We Can! (Ways to Enhance Children's Activity and Nutrition), the program offers helpful resources and evidence-based curricula for community programs targeting children ages 8 to 13 years and their parents or primary caregivers. More than 125 communities in over 34 states are now implementing We Can! programs. More information is also available at wecan.nhlbi.nih/.







Further information



*
We Can! (Ways to Enhance Children's Activity & Nutrition), wecan.nhlbi.nih/
















*
Metabolic Syndrome in Girls (November 7, 2005, news release), nhlbi.nih/new/press/05-11-07.htm



*
Decline in Physical Activity Plays Key Role in Weight Gain Among Adolescent Girls (July 14, 2005, news release), nhlbi.nih/new/press/05-07-14.htm



*
"What We Know about Obesity Development During Adolescence: Findings from the NHLBI Growth and Health Study," presented at Predictors of Obesity, Weight Gain, Diet, and Physical Activity Workshop, Bethesda, MD, August 4-5, 2004, nhlbi.nih/meetings/workshops/predictors/abstracts/kimm2.htm



* NHLBI Growth and Health Study (NGHS), nhlbi.nih/resources/deca/descriptions/nghs.htm



Part of the National Institutes of Health, the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) plans, conducts, and supports research related to the causes, prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of heart, blood vessel, lung, and blood diseases; and sleep disorders. The Institute also administers national health education campaigns on women and heart disease, healthy weight for children, and other topics. NHLBI press releases and other materials are available online at nhlbi.nih/.



The National Institutes of Health (NIH) -- The Nation's Medical Research Agency -- includes 27 Institutes and Centers and is a component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. It is the primary federal agency for conducting and supporting basic, clinical and translational medical research, and it investigates the causes, treatments, and cures for both common and rare diseases. For more information about NIH and its programs, visit nih/.



Contact: Susan Dambrauskas


NIH/National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute

Mother Jones Examines Indian Surrogacy Clinics That Cater To Western Customers

Demand for Indian surrogate's has surged among foreigners seeking a lower-cost, less-regulated alternative to U.S. surrogacy, Mother Jones reports. However, some Indian clinics are attracting scrutiny for cloistering surrogates in small dormitories, a practice the clinics say allows them to better monitor patients' pregnancies and ensure that surrogates have good living conditions.

India legalized surrogacy in 2002. There are at least 350 fertility clinics throughout the country, although it is unclear how many clinics offer surrogacy services because the government does not track the issue. According to Mother Jones, "at minimum, Indian surrogacy services now attract hundreds of Western clients each year."

Mother Jones focuses on the Akanksha Infertility Clinic in Anand, which has facilitated 232 surrogate births since 2004. Surrogacy services at the clinic range from $15,000 to $20,000, compared with $50,000 to $100,000 in the few U.S. states that permit surrogacy. The clinic requires surrogates to live in its dormitories during their entire pregnancies, and surrogates receive $50 monthly up to delivery, which almost always is performed by caesarean section. According to Mother Jones, c-sections "are considered riskier for the baby under normal circumstances and double to triple the woman's risk of death during childbirth," but they are "far faster than vaginal labor -- and some clinics charge clients extra for them."

Surrogates also receive $500 at the end of each trimester, and the balance of the payment upon delivery. In total, women at the Akanksha clinic who deliver receive about $5,000 to $6,000, Mother Jones reports. If a surrogate miscarries, she is allowed to keep the payments she has received up to that point. Under the clinic's contract, a surrogate also is permitted to obtain an abortion, but she must reimburse the clinic and client for all expenses.

Despite the surrogacy industry's growth, it is not officially regulated by the Indian government, and there are no legal standards for the treatment of surrogates. India's Parliament is expected to introduce a bill this year that would address surrogacy concerns, likely granting regulatory responsibility to the states (Carney, Mother Jones, March/April 2010).


Reprinted with kind permission from nationalpartnership. You can view the entire Daily Women's Health Policy Report, search the archives, or sign up for email delivery here. The Daily Women's Health Policy Report is a free service of the National Partnership for Women & Families, published by The Advisory Board Company.


© 2010 The Advisory Board Company. All rights reserved.

International Law Permits Abusive Fathers Custody Of Children

A new survey of court cases against battered women living abroad shows that when the women left their abusive partners and returned with their children to the United States, half of the time, U.S. courts sent the children back, usually to their fathers.



The survey, co-authored by a University of Washington researcher, also shows that almost a third of these estranged husbands filed criminal kidnapping charges against their wives.



Released in time for Human Rights Day, Dec. 10, the survey is intended to help to establish domestic violence as a factor in whether courts send children back to their fathers. And the authors of the report hope their website serves as a resource for women and lawyers faced with Hague petitions.



The children's return is in accordance with an international treaty, the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction, which affects thousands of children each year.



The Hague Convention does not explicitly factor in domestic violence in deciding whether to send children back to the country where they lived. But since the treaty was created 30 years ago, social science research has demonstrated that a child's exposure to domestic violence is just as harmful as direct abuse. Children who witness domestic violence are at higher risk for emotional problems, and later in life, they have a greater risk for violence in adult interpersonal relationships.



Now social scientists say that it's time for the law to catch up with science, especially as these cases are likely to dramatically increase as more binational families form and countries such as India and Japan consider adopting the treaty in the next few years.



"The law is not paying attention to the effects domestic violence have on women and their children," said Taryn Lindhorst, co-author of the report and a UW associate professor of social work. "This is like a tip of an iceberg: we've only seen some of the cases."



Lindhorst, an expert in the effects of domestic abuse for women, co-authored the report. The report is the first effort in the United States to interview mothers and attorneys about their experiences with the Hague Convention, in hopes of better preparing mothers and their lawyers for court proceedings in these cases.



The 404-page report, funded and published by the U.S. National Institute of Justice, includes analysis and excerpts of interviews with 22 mothers and 23 lawyers who represented mothers and fathers in Hague lawsuits and an analysis of court decisions on previous Hague cases involving domestic violence.



Most of the mothers had been living with their husbands in Europe, the Middle East or Latin America. They had moved abroad when their marriages were more stable or they had been tricked into moving.



In the report, the co-authors describe frequent, life-threatening domestic abuse endured by the women: beatings, threats with guns, ice picks and other weapons and - in a few cases - rape. Since most of the women were not citizens of the country where they were living, they were usually unable to obtain resources available to domestic violence victims in that country.
















Moving back to the United States became the best option.



None of the women in the study knew about the Hague Convention before returning to the United States, Lindhorst said. Many of them learned about it when federal agents arrived at their homes to take their children into custody. Some mothers were required to be in court within a matter of hours. Scrambling for a lawyer, most could not find a lawyer experienced with the Hague Convention.



The court decisions were grim for the women. In almost half, 12 of 22, the court sent the children back to the country they had fled from with their mothers. In seven of those cases, the fathers gained custody. Seven women - a third of the sample - also faced criminal kidnapping charges in foreign courts.



Ironically, when the Hague Convention Treaty was created in 1980, it was intended to protect women and children. Lawmakers wanted to expedite the return of children taken by a parent - usually the father - who was unsatisfied by a child custody decision.



But, as it turns out, the law has been used primarily by fathers. Nearly 70 percent of Hague petitions are filed by fathers, said Jeffrey Edleson, co-author and professor of social work at the University of Minnesota.



"In many cases, filing a Hague petition is an attempt by the abusive father to use the court to extend control over mother and child," said Edleson, an expert on children's exposure to domestic violence in the home.



In the Hague Convention cases examined in the report, courts tended not to consider domestic violence toward the mother when assessing whether the children should be returned to their father. In cases where the children are returned and end up in the fathers' care, it's because the judges see the mother as a kidnapper, Edleson said.



Once returned to the father, the children may be exposed to more violence. Typically, the mothers move back too to be closer to their children and some were abused again. Sometimes the fathers would physically abuse their children.



The report is part of the HagueDV Project on international child abduction and domestic violence, led by Lindhorst and Edleson. On Human Rights Day, Dec. 10, the group will hold a free event in Minneapolis of actors reading the battered mothers' stories interspersed with commentary by law and social science experts. The event will also be available by webcast.



Source:

Molly McElroy

University of Washington

80 Percent Of Cases Of Postnatal Depression Predicted By New Method

Worldwide, 13% of women who give birth suffer from postnatal depression, which causes a significant deterioration in a mother's quality of life and her ability to care for her baby. Now, Spanish researchers have developed a model to diagnose this illness with a predictive power of 80% - the best result to date for this kind of depression.



"Early diagnosis of postnatal depression would make it possible to intervene to prevent it from developing among women at risk", Salvador Tortajada, lead author of the study and a researcher at the Polytechnic University of Valencia (UPV), tells SINC.



The experts studied data on 1,397 Spanish women who gave birth between December 2003 and October 2004 in seven hospitals in Spain, and devised various models that can predict - with an 80% success rate - which mothers run the risk of developing depression during the first weeks after giving birth.



This study, which is the first of its kind in Spain and has been published recently in the journal Methods of Information in Medicine, gives the best results to date in terms of predicting this illness. "Now it needs clinical evaluation, and for psychiatrists to start to test it directly on patients in order to study the true potential of these tools", says Tortajada.



The researchers used artificial neuronal networks and extracted a series of risk factors highlighted in previous studies - the extent of social support for the mother, prior psychiatric problems in the family, emotional changes during the birth, neuroticism and polymorphisms in the serotonin transport gene (genes with high levels of expression lead to an increased risk of developing the illness).



They also discovered two protection factors that reduce the risk of depression - age (the older the woman the lower her chance of depression), and whether or not a woman has worked during pregnancy (which reduces the risk). The researcher points out that: "it can be seen that these factors are relevant in the neuronal networks, but not by using other statistical methods". The path is now clear for future studies to corroborate these findings.



However, many studies have shown that between 10 and 15% of women who give birth suffer from depression, normally between the second and third month after having given birth. This illness affects the patient's emotional and cognitive functions (in extreme cases leading to suicidal tendencies), and may have serious knock-on effects on the child's future development.



Source:
SINC


FECYT - Spanish Foundation for Science and Technology

Obama's Call For 'Empathy' In Supreme Court Justice Reflects 'Understanding Of Judicial Role,' Opinion Piece Says

President Obama has said he wants his replacement for retiring Supreme Court Justice David Souter to be "'someone who understands that justice isn't about some abstract theory or footnote in a case book; it is also about how our laws affect the daily realities of people's lives,'" Washington Post columnist Ruth Marcus writes in an opinion piece. Obama also has said that the "'quality of empathy'" is an "'essential ingredient for arriving at just decision and outcomes.'" According to Marcus, this call for a "quality of empathy" is a "red alert for conservatives," who fear Obama will appoint an "activist judge" who would rule based on partisan views. She notes that Steven Calabresi, a law professor at Northwestern University and co-founder of the Federalist Society, said in a Wall Street Journal opinion piece before the election that Obama's "emphasis on empathy in essence requires the appointment of judges committed in advance to violating" a judge's oath to rule with equal justice to all people. According to Calabresi, Obama is advocating to "tear the blindfold off, so the judge can rule for the party he emphasizes with most."

Marcus writes that she also would "be on the barricades" if she thought Obama was "advocating for a pick-your-favorite-side approach." However, Obama's position "reflects a more thoughtful, more nuanced understanding of the judicial role," as opposed to Chief Justice John Roberts' analogy that likens a justice to a baseball umpire. Marcus continues, "Like its downscale cousin, the dictate that judges should 'interpret the law, not legislate from the bench,' the judge as umpire trope is fundamentally misleading," adding that if the correct conclusion "was always available to a judge who merely thinks hard enough about it, we could program computers to fulfill the judicial function." The most important Supreme Court cases require a judge to bring "life experiences" to the bench, as well as knowledge of the rule of the courts, and finally, "as Obama put it, 'a broader version of what America should be,'" Marcus says.

Marcus writes that Obama's "most controversial formulation of the empathy argument came in a 2007 speech to Planned Parenthood." Obama said, "The issues that come before the court are not sport. They're life and death. And we need somebody who's got ... the empathy to recognize what it's like to be a young, teenage mom; the empathy to understand what it's like to be poor or African American or gay or disabled or old." Marcus writes that having the "'empathy to recognize' should not determine the outcome of a case, but it should inform the judge's approach," concluding that a justice's "blindfold is a useful metaphor for impartiality. It's not a fixed prescription for insensitivity, or for obliviousness to the real world swirling outside the arid confines of the courthouse" (Marcus, Washington Post, 5/6).


Reprinted with kind permission from nationalpartnership. You can view the entire Daily Women's Health Policy Report, search the archives, or sign up for email delivery here. The Daily Women's Health Policy Report is a free service of the National Partnership for Women & Families, published by The Advisory Board Company.


© 2009 The Advisory Board Company. All rights reserved.