The Massachusetts Home Visiting Initiative (MHVI) at the Massachusetts Department of Public Health is issuing a Request for Information (RFI) related to implementing the Welcome Family program in select communities.
The intent of this RFI is to provide opportunities for providers and consumers to participate in the design of new or redesigned human and social services programs. This RFI is also intended to gauge the level of interest among eligible applicants.
Welcome Family is a program that offers a universal, one-time nurse home visit to all mothers with newborns in the program catchment area. The 90-minute visit is conducted up to eight weeks postpartum (ideally within two weeks postpartum) by a nurse with maternal and child health experience.
At this time, Welcome Family is available for bid in four Massachusetts communities: Fall River, Boston, Lawrence, and Lowell. A minimum of one contract will be awarded for each community.
The goal of the program is to provide an entry point into a system of care for children and families. The objectives of Welcome Family are as follows:
- To identify and prioritize family needs by screening mothers with newborns for health, safety, emotional health and family wellbeing.
- To respond to identified needs of families with newborns by:
- providing brief interventions, education and support; and
- making appropriate referrals to formal and informal services.
- To optimize use of the service system to meet identified needs of families by improving agency coordination and reducing duplication.
- To identify gaps in service delivery in order to improve resource allocation and inform policy.
MHVI will be seeking proposals from qualified vendors, through the Request for Responses (RFR) process, to provide services to mothers with newborns through the Welcome Family program.