Georgia: Technology and WIC - A Comprehensive Approach to Public Health

Overview

With funding through USDA and Tufts University's Telehealth Intervention Strategies for WIC (THIS-WIC) project, the Georgia WIC department will be implementing a telehealth solution for nutrition and breastfeeding support. The purpose of this study is to evaluate this telehealth solution. The research/evaluation involves completing online surveys. The evaluation will focus on participant satisfaction, usage of the telehealth solution, and use of information collected on the WIC participant through the WIC management information system (MIS). It is hypothesized that the telehealth solution will increase WIC participant's satisfaction with nutrition and breastfeeding support while also reducing the burden of attending in-person care.

Telehealth can reduce barriers and increase access to care, and it can be applied to the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC). WIC is a federal nutrition assistance program that helps low-income women with children up to age 5. There is a large volume of research that supports remote patient monitoring, and the most benefits are found when telehealth is used for communication and counseling. The USDA awarded Tufts University a grant to test and evaluate the use of telehealth innovations in the delivery of USDA's WIC program. Tufts University then offered the USDA/Tufts Telehealth Intervention Strategies for WIC (THIS-WIC) grant opportunity to WIC state agencies across the US. THIS-WIC selected 7 WIC State Agencies to receive grants, and the GA state agency is one recipient. The THIS-WIC team at Tufts University is leading the evaluation of these telehealth solutions in collaboration with funded WIC State Agencies. THIS-WIC aims to generate evidence from GA's video-conferencing telehealth solution to inform how the telehealth platform supports WIC services compared to usual in-person care. Evaluation findings will inform stakeholders about the platform's benefits and how viable it is to sustain and adapt more widely. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the effectiveness of this telehealth solution by having clients complete surveys on their comfortability using telehealth and their satisfaction with the telehealth appointment. Additionally, secondary demographic and other nutrition-related information about study participants is already collected in the MIS and will be utilized.