The Healthy Tomorrows Partnership for Children Program, a cooperative agreement between the Maternal and Child Health Bureau and the American Academy of Pediatrics, and funder of three Children's Vision Massachusetts coalition projects, has included CVMA in a video created to commemorate HTPCP's 25th Anniversary. The video presents grantee projects from across the country and includes parts of the CVMA video created by past Prevent Blindness intern, Brianne Bostian, MPH, and Prevent Blindness volunteer Alex Shi, MSc.
See the Video Here! |
The purpose of the Children's Vision Massachusetts Coalition Question Work Group (QWG) is to evaluate current practice, and explore new approaches, to vision assessment for children birth to 36 months. Through a careful review of vision questions on developmental screening tools used in pediatric practices, public schools, and community based programs, the group's goal is to determine if additional questions are indicated, introduce new questions if called for, and decide if guidelines for referral to vision care based on responses to questions are accurate. Resultant recommendations may include use of developmental questions as standalones in some settings, or in conjunction with devices and/or other tools in others.
The QWG met recently to provide update on local and national work, offer guidance on the pilot study that has been introduced by Gayathri Srinivasan, OD and study team at Early Head Start sites in Boston, and learn more about related coalition supported vision initiatives underway within the Pediatric Physicians' Organization at Boston Children's Hospital and the EyeSEE Pilot Study in Springfield, MA. The Question Work Group is one of three projects funded by the Healthy Tomorrows Partnership for Children Program.
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A new coalition supported bill, filed by Representative Barber, with nine legislators stepping up to co-sponsor, will require the Department of Public Health to issue a report, by school, relating to vision screening for children entering kindergarten, as required by Section 57 of Chapter 71 of Massachusetts General Laws. This mandate directs school nurses to receive documentation of a completed vision screening and/or eye examination performed during a child's preschool year. This will be the first legislative report on the law's impact since the school entry vision screening requirement was passed into law in 2005. The Report will be filed with the senate and house clerks, the senate and house chairs of the joint committee on public health and published in a clearly visible location on the department of public health's website not later than six months after the effective date of the act. Joining Representative Barber on this bill are Senators DiDomenico and Jehlen, and Representatives Balser, DuBois, Garballey, Gentile, Provost, D. Rogers and Peisch.
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Force
CVMA convened a first meeting of Pediatric Eyeglass Task Force in January to gain a better understanding of the access, quality, and timeliness of delivery systems related to prescription eyeglasses for children in Massachusetts. The multi-disciplinary committee includes eye care providers, opticians, health care advocates and parents.
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Massachusetts Early Intervention Consortium Annual Conference
Understanding Vision: Critical for Early Intervention Success has been accepted for presentation at the MEIC Annual Conference which will be held at the Best Western Royal Plaza Hotel, Marlborough, MA on May 6-7, 2015. Presenters are coalition members Jean Ramsey, MD, MPH, Danielle Ledoux, MD, and Kathy Majzoub, RN, MBA. A CVMA exhibitor display will be staffed by Quita Christison from Prevent Blindness.
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