Public Health Nutrtion: Title V

Focus on Mothers, Children and Families

Since 1935 the federal government, through Title V of the Social Security Act, has provided monies to states to help meet the critical health needs of mothers and children. Since that time Maternal and Child Health (MCH) has been an important employer of public health nutrition personnel.

At the federal level, the Maternal and Child Health Bureau (MCHB) of the Health Resources and Service Administration (HRSA) provides leadership, partnership, and resources to advance the health of mothers, infants, children and adolescents — including families with low income levels, those with diverse racial and ethnic heritages and those living in rural or isolated areas without access to care.

MCHB also fosters the development and adoption of national standards and guidelines for prenatal care, for healthy and safe child care, and for the health supervision of infants, children, and adolescents.

See Bright Futures and Bright Futures in Practice: Nutrition as an example of this.

State health departments oversee a range of state and local of MCH activities. Nutrition is a required component of these activities and nutritionists are employed in most state MCH programs and in local organizations offering MCH services.

Recent amendments to Title V emphasize the development of community and statewide systems of service for all children and parents.

These systems assure access to essential services especially during pregnancy and childhood, including routine and high risk prenatal care, adolescent pregnancy, neonatal intensive care, preventive and primary health care and dental services for children and adolescents.

Comprehensive services for children with special health care needs must be addressed in federally funded, state MCH programs. This is illustrated in the following model from Wisconsin.