Publications

2024 FOCUS on Public Policy is a page-a-day style publication. Like the annual FOCUS book, this calendar shares indicator data and policy solutions related to the impact of COVID-19 on Delaware children. Data are grouped into categories of health, education, economic security, and family/community. A very special thanks goes out to the Delaware Libraries for co-sponsoring this year's calendar. Follow @dekidscount on Instagram, Facebook or X for your daily dose of data and policy! 

2024 Legislative Calendar Similar to previous editions of our annual Fact Book, the 2024 KIDS COUNT in Delaware FOCUS on Public Policy provides an overview of child well-being in Delaware and reports on select indicators across the four traditionally reported categories of health, eduation, economic security, and family/community. This year's edition spotlights public policy examples linked to data on childhood outcomes and reminds readers the importance of data-driven decisions by policy makers.

2024 Legislative Wrap-Up This annual legislative wrap-up highlights legislation passed in the previous session which affect children and their families.

2024 What Would It Take Delaware? is a data overview examining "what would it take" for Delaware to rank best in the nation for child well-being in 16 indicators for which the Annie E. Casey Foundation's annual national KIDS COUNT Data Book reports. 

KIDS COUNT in Delaware Issue Brief: Child Nutrition is a data brief which reviews data on food security, equity of access to food, federal programs that supplement food quantity, which influence a child's access to health food options, and child weight.

Census Brief: 2020 Child Population reviews the U.S. Census Breau Redistricting Data that was released on August 12, 2021. The release is the first from the 2020 Census that breaks out data by all children compared to all adults. While Delaware's total population increased by 10.2 percent between 2010 and 2020, Delaware's child (0-17) population increased by less than one percentage point (640 children or 0.3%) according to data from the U.S. Census Bureau. Because of growth in the adult population, children now make up a smaller proportion of the state's total population.

2024 National Data Book The 35th edition of the Annie E. Casey Foundation's KIDS COUNT Data Book describes poor educational proficiency results that were exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic, reviews chronic absence and adverse childhood experience data, describes child well-being across 16 indicators, and makes recommendations for smart policies to help support a students to achieve educational proficiency.

​Projects

Evaluation of the Del-CAN Program, 2016-2023

Researchers in the University of Delaware Center for Community Research and Service, Center for Drug and Health Studies and Department of Sociology are partnering with researchers at the University of Maryland, College Park on a systematic, mixed-methods evaluation of the Delaware Contraceptive Access Now (DEL-CAN) intervention which aims to reduce unintended pregnancies, reduce Medicaid costs for unintended pregnancies, and support policy development that enables contraceptive access to all women who desire it. The evaluation is designed to understand the DEL-CAN Plans effectiveness and cost-effectiveness, and to derive lessons about mechanisms leading to initial and sustained impacts in Delaware, and to impacts that are generalizable to other states. A five-year evaluation period, 2016 to 2021, is planned and the use of Medicaid transactions data will play an important part in the project.

Substance Abuse Treatment Research

CCRS is involved in two projects focused on measuring opioid metrics within Delaware. The first project is a multi-state collaboration lead by AcademyHealth State University Partnership Learning Network (SUPLN) using a distributed research network (DRN) model (MODRN)​. In all participating states, the Medicaid Medical Director participates in the steering committee which defines appropriate metrics.

CCRS is also participating in the Delaware Division of Medicaid and Medical Assistance's (DMMA) Substance Use Disorder Prevention that Promotes Opioid Recovery and Treatment for Patients and Communities (SUPPORT) grant.

CCRS is presently collaborating with John Hopkins University on an evaluation of a MOUD treatment program for incarcerated individuals and follow-up after release.

Delaware INBRE Projects

CCRS, as part of the Delaware IDeA Network of Biomedical Research Excellence (INBRE) Centralized Research Service Network is collaborating on the following INBRE Core Access voucher projects:

• Describing the Sickle Cell Population in Delaware to Inform Novel Models of Care Delivery. Stephanie Howe Guarino, MD, MSHP​, Christiana Care & Nemours. CCRS researchers: E. Nescott & M.J. McDuffie.
• Linking Evictions, Homelessness, and Pediatric Health​. J. J. Cutuli, PhD, Nemours & S. Metraux, CCRS. CCRS researchers: M.J.McDuffie & E. Nescott.
• ​Area Deprivation and Hypertension Diagnosis in Youth: Mediating Role of Obesity​. Carissa Baker-Smith, MD, Nemours. CCRS researchers: M.J. McDuffie & E. Nescott.
• Impact of Health Literacy on Medication Adherence among Black Medicaid Beneficiaries with Hypertension in Delaware. Yandelala Cuffee, PhD, UD College of Health Sciences. CCRS researchers: M.J. McDuffie & E. Nescott.
• ​How Do Medicaid Policies Affect Use of Primary Care? ​Katie Fitzpatrick, PhD. Biden School of Public Policy & Administration. CCRS researchers: K. Gifford & M.J. McDuffie.
• Exploration and analysis of child lead testing and intervention in the Medicaid population ages 0-4 through the years 2014-2018​. Kelli O. Thompson, Nemours Children Health Systems. CCRS researchers: E. Nescott & M.J. McDuffie.

Delaware INBRE is supported by the Institutional Development Award (IDeA) from the National Institute of Health's National Institute of General Medical Sciences under grant number P20GM103446.

Delaware Homeless

Understanding and identifying shared populations and their health care and housing needs based upon matching Medicaid management information system and the Community Management Information System databases.​

Briefs

Overview of Medicaid in Delaware

Journal Articles

Donohue, J.M., Jarlenski, M.P., Kim, J.Y., Tang, L., Ahrens, K., Allen, L., Austin, A., Barnes, A.J., Burns, M., Chang, C.H., Clark, S., Cole, E., Crane, D., Cunningham, P., Idala, D., Junker, S., Lanier, P., Mauk, R., McDuffie, M.J.​, Mohamoud, S., Pauly, N., Sheets, L., Talbert, J., Zivin, K., Gordin, A.J., Kennedy, S. (2021). "Use of Medications for Treatment of Opioid Use Disorder Among US Medicaid Enrollees in 11 States, 2014-2018​"​. Journal of the American Medical Association. 326(2):154-164. doi: 10.1001/jama.2021.7374​.

Gifford, K., McDuffie, M.J., Rashid, H., Knight, E., McColl, R., Boudreaux M. & Rendall, M. (2021). “Postpartum contraception method type and risk of a short inter-pregnancy interval in a state Medicaid population.” Contraception. First published May 2021. doi: 10.1016/j.contraception.2021.05.006​.

​Briefs

Overview of Poverty in Delaware

Neonatal Abstinance Syndrome: An Overview of Delaware and National Data

Opioid Use Disorder in Delaware: Policies and Programs

Reproductive Healthcare and COVID-19

Delaware's Fertility Rate and COVID-19

Health Policy and Access to Long-Acting Reversible Contraceptives

Projects

Health Equity Guide 2019

A collaborative research team from the University's Partnership for Healthy Communities, the Center for Community Research and Service and the Delaware Division of Public Health updated the Health Equity Guide first published in 2015. The research team focused on structural racism as a fundamental cause of health inequities.

Journal Articles

McColl, R., Nescott, E. (2024). Youth Mental Health in the Wake of the COVID-19 Pandemic. Delaware Journal of Public Health. 10(4), 62-65. Doi: 10.32481/djph.2024.10.14.

Cunninham, P., Barnes, A., Mohamoud, S., Allen, L., talbert, J., Jarlenski, M., Kim, J., Gordon, A., Tang, L., Change, C., Junker, S., Mauk, R., Ahrens, K., Austin, A., Clark, S., McDuffie, M.​​, Kennedy, S., Donohue, J., Burnes, M. (2022). "Follow-up after ED visits for opioid use disorder: Do they reduce future overdoses?​​" Journal of Substance Abuse Treatment​, published on-line May 20, 2022. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jsa​t.2022.108807​​.

Jarlenski, M., Chen, Q., Ahrens, K., Allen, L., Austin, A., Chappell, C., Donohue, J., Hammerslag, L.,; Lanier, P., McDuffie, M.J​.​, Talbert, J., Tang, L., Krans, E., on behalf of the Medicaid Outcomes Distributed Research Network (MODRN)​ (2022)."Postpartum Follow-up Care for Pregnant Persons With Opioid Use Disorder and Hepatitis C Virus Infection​." Obstetrics & Gynecology. 139(5): 916-918.​​

Knight, E., Bogan, C. ​(2021). "​What 2020 Taught Us about the Politics and Teaching of Public Health”​Delaware Journal of Public Health. Volume 7, Number 2, 64-67.​

Bell, A., Gifford, K., Rashid, H., McDuffie, M.J. and Knight, E. (2020). "Power of Mom: A Mixed Methods Investigation of Mothers Influence on Womens Contraceptive Attitudes and Behaviors." Maternal and Child Health Journal, January 2020.

Rashid, H. (2019). "Review of In Search of the Perfect Health System by Mark Britnell." Revue Francaise de Civilisation Britannique, Vol. XXIV-3.

McDonough, K. (2019). "Social determinants of health: Life expectancy and the relationship with race, education, and poverty in Delaware. "Delaware Journal of Public Health, February, 2019, 105-107.

Journal Articles

Crone, B., Metr​aux, S. & Sbrocco, T. (2021). “Health Service Access Among African American Veterans Experiencing Homelessness.” Journal of Racial and Ethnic Health Disparities. Published online. DOI: doi:10.1007/s40615-021-01119-z.​

Ervin, E., Poppe, B., Onwuka, A., Keedy, H., Metraux, S., Jones, L., Sandel, M., Kelleher, K. (2021). "Characteristics Associated with Homeless Pregnant Women in Columbus, Ohio." Maternal & Child Health. Published online October 6, 2021; doi: 10.1007/s10995-021-03227-y. ​

Metraux, S​., (2021). "Review of Mean Streets: Homelessness, Public Space, and the Limits of Capital (by Don Mitchell)". European Journal of Homelessness 15(2): 355-357.​

Cusack, M., Graham, F., Metraux, S.​, Metzger, D.Culhane, D. (2021). "At the Intersection of Homeless Encampments and Heroin Addiction: Service Use Barriers, Facilitators, and Recommendations from the City of Philadelphia's Encampment Resolution Pilot​". Social Work in Public Health, 36(2):150-163​.

Byrne, T., Cashy, J., Metraux, S., Blosnich, J. R., Cusack, M., Culhane, D. P., McInnes, D.K., Culhane, E., and Montgomery, A. E. (2020). "Association between registered sex offender status and risk housing instability and homelessness among veterans​". Journal of Interpersonal Violence, 1-12.