Child health

Due to the significant influence of child health on other developmental outcomes, some of the early childhood home visiting models in the HomVEE review address the promotion of child health in some way. Models that begin during a mother’s pregnancy aim to improve birth outcomes by linking mothers to prenatal health care and providing them with information about fetal development. Following the birth of the child, programs ensure that children have access to health care, receive appropriate well-child care and immunizations, and receive appropriate medical care for illnesses and injuries. Some programs also provide information to parents about ways to support physical health, such as the importance of nutritious meals and physical activity.

Measures of a child’s growth, physical health, and use of health services (such as immunizations) are all included in this domain. Outcome measures in this domain are birth outcomes and counts of health care service use extracted from medical records. Other outcome measures are based on parent reports about children’s health and use of health care services. It is also important to note that some unfavorable or ambiguous outcomes, such as number of days hospitalized, may be due to increased access to health care. In other words, families’ participation in the home visiting program may have increased the likelihood that they would receive needed health care services.

Diet and feeding measures belong in this domain. One related outcome, the Breastfeeding Self-Efficacy Scale, belongs in the positive parenting practices domain instead because it measures the parent’s attitudes.

Child mental and behavioral health do not belong in this domain. HomVEE categorizes measures of children’s mental and behavioral health in the child development and school readiness domain, in contrast to the measures of physical health that are reported in the child health domain.

Health care encounters due to injuries and ingestions do not belong in this domain. Most health care encounters for children belong in the child health domain. However, health care encounters that may occur specifically as a result of child maltreatment, such as treatment for injuries or ingestions, are placed in the reductions in child maltreatment domain.

Health insurance coverage does not belong in this domain. HomVEE places access to health insurance, for both the child and mother, in the family economic self-sufficiency domain.

The HomVEE review examined the research on 50 models with studies published in 1979 through 2019. (HomVEE counts related versions, commonly referred to as adaptations, together in this section and in the table below. More information is available in the procedures and standards handbook. Of the 19 models with manuscripts about high- or moderate-quality studies that measured outcomes in this domain, 14 had favorable effects.

The effects shown in the research are grouped into four categories: (1) favorable, (2) no effect, (3) unfavorable or ambiguous, and (4) not measured. Results for models that only have low-rated research are listed as “not applicable.” For more information on these categories please read the procedures and standards handbook. Only results from manuscripts that receive a moderate or high rating are considered below. This table includes manuscripts links to more information on the model’s effectiveness, implementation, and details on findings in this domain.

Effects shown in research — Child health domain