Parents ensure their newborn gets care, but may neglect their own health, a new LDI study confirms.
Rural parents, in particular, had more hospitalizations and acute care visits and faced more problems getting postpartum obstetric or gynecological care than their urban peers. But parents’ health fared worse than their infants across the board.
“People naturally prioritize their infant’s health,” said LDI Senior Fellow Sara Handley, who led the study. “But parents need to be in good physical, mental, emotional, and financial health to fully care for their babies.”
Pediatric visits may be an opportunity to improve care for postpartum parents, the study suggests. Using an innovative approach that studied parents and infants together, based on evidence of their interrelated health, Handley, LDI Senior Fellow Emily Gregory, and colleagues found that babies had better health than their parents. These findings support the integration of parental care with infant visits.
Study Finds Rural-Urban, Parent-Infant Differences
The study used 2006–2018 data from the National Health Interview Survey, a key public data source for understanding the U.S. maternal health crisis. Since 1957, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has conducted the survey to improve the health of Americans.
The data included self-reported information on more than 4,000 rural-residing and more than 25,000 urban-residing parents and infants. The researchers compared rural and urban groups of parents and infants in terms of health status, care utilization, and barriers to care. They also examined rural-urban differences in parent-infant units.