Press Releases

For Immediate Release

Contact: Pam Albers, RN, MS., Executive Director, 208-6347 or Kristen Hill, Public Relations, 208-5119

Brighter Futures participates in Nurse Family Partnership National Forum in Washington DC

Montgomery County, April, 2004 – For more than 25 years, the Nurse-Family Partnership (NFP) has provided a lifeline to families in need through compassion, health education, and practical advice. NFP is a voluntary nurse home-visitation program for low-income, first–time mothers and their families. From pregnancy through the child’s second birthday, trained nurses visit in the homes of these mothers, providing help with prenatal care and parenting skills. Parents learn how to raise stronger, more stable families. And, their babies grow up healthier – physically, mentally and emotionally. NFP currently operates in more than 250 sites in 23 states across the country, serving an estimated 12,000 families each year.

On March 11, 2004, in Washington, DC, congressional hosts and speakers including Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, Senator Arlen Specter, Senator Barbara Boxer, Senator Dianne Feinstein among many leading advocates and well known contributors in the area of maternal and infant health gathered together with Dr. David Olds, founder of the NFP and Dr. Ann Jones, the NFP national director, to celebrate the program’s successes throughout the country. Nurse home-visitors Polly Morgan and Denise Robinson came to Washington as representatives of Montgomery County’s own Nurse Family Partnership-based organization Brighter Futures, a part of Help Me Grow. In Montgomery County each year, hundreds of moms younger than 21 and their families are extremely grateful for Brighter Futures….this little known but highly regarded program in the community is giving these families a lot more to look forward to in life. Brighter Futures is modeled after the David Olds Nurse-Family Partnership model only it serves young moms and their babies from prenatal care until the child is 3 years old (not 2). As with NFP, Brighter Futures is evidence based and achieves these goals:

• Improving pregnancy outcomes
• Improving child health and development
• Improving parents’ lives

As part of the goals above, fewer babies are born preterm, there is a reduction in cigarette smoking during pregnancy, there is a very significant 79% reduced rate of child abuse and neglect, mothers are finishing school, obtaining a GED and/or getting jobs, there are far fewer arrests among mothers (teen mothers are far less likely to engage in sex, crime, drug and alcohol use if they have a nurse home-visitor in their lives.) So, as these families become stronger and more resourceful, the entire Montgomery County community benefits in countless ways. Brighter Futures nurse Polly Morgan was thrilled about the support and enthusiasm shared at the Washington DC NFP Forum, “This is the program to change society. You help a young mom to love herself and raise her child to follow a new pattern. What happened in DC convinced me that there are many other (important) people in big places who believe that.”

A part of the mission of Brighter Futures is to help young women identify their strengths despite the horrible adversity they have encountered. “The program is making an enormous difference in the lives of these women and their children” affirms Tom Breitenbach, board member of Brighter Futures and President & CEO of Premiere Health Partners.

Founded in 1996 under the auspices of Miami Valley Hospital, Brighter Futures now receives the vast majority of its funding from the Help Me Grow initiative. State funding, of which Help Me Grow is a part, has experienced cuts in recent years. According to Pam Albers, Executive Director of Brighter Futures, “When our funding decreases we are unable to serve all of the hundreds of vulnerable women and their children in Montgomery County whom we currently help every day. However, on a much more positive note, we realize there is so much generosity in the Miami Valley community, both on an individual level, and also in terms of foundation and corporate giving.”

You can contact Pam Albers directly, at 208-6347, to inquire further about the program and ways you or your company can make a difference in the lives of young families with Brighter Futures, 208-6347. Brighter Futures is also planning to hold a local forum in the near future to increase awareness about this lifesaving program.