Development monitoring education toolkit now available for employers at no cost
CONCORD, Mass., May 15, 2023 /PRNewswire/ — Lorestry, by Alea Diagnostics (Alea), is announcing their parent education toolkit, related to the developmental care of infants and children, is now available for employers to share with their employees at no cost.
About 10,000 new babies are born in the United States each day. Of those children, about 1,800-2,000 will be diagnosed with developmental delays, and 277 will be diagnosed on the autism spectrum.
Developmental monitoring, needed to support screenings, referrals for comprehensive evaluations, and early intervention, is now a recommendation of the CDC and the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP). National data shows 63% of children (9 months to 3 years) do not receive developmental screening.
Under the Consolidated Appropriations Act (CAA) of 2020 (see Forbes article), employers and other purchasers of health benefits (plan sponsors) now have a fiduciary duty to their employees to provide health benefits that are cost-effective, high-quality, and meet mental health parity requirements. On April 13, 2023, the Employee Benefits Security Administration, part of the Department of Labor, reiterated that evidence-informed preventative care and development screenings for infants and children are required.
“Parents trust that benefits purchased on their child’s behalf meet Affordable Care Act (ACA) requirements including developmental surveillance (monitoring) and developmental and emotional health screenings. Data suggests that plan sponsors are purchasing, but not enforcing, well-baby care benefits, and not keeping up with CDC/AAP recommendations that can reduce healthcare costs for families,” said Linda Craib RN, MBA, founder of Alea and former U.S. children’s healthcare practice leader at Deloitte.
“Proactive developmental monitoring is value-based. By making the education toolkit available for plan sponsors, we hope to improve how employers engage and support families, and reduce future family healthcare costs. After months of communications with plan sponsors, we found many weren’t aware of development monitoring. Plan sponsors who fail to act and enforce infant and child development standards of care from providers, will continue to face an ever-growing tsunami of children with developmental needs,” said Craib.
Lorestry engages parents as health historians, storytellers, and collaborative partners for real-time observational data gathering. The company provides parents with their own data set that they can share with providers and education teams to accelerate care access.
SOURCE Alea Diagnostics, Inc.
Originally published at https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/baby-canary-in-a-coal-mine-301824672.html
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