Policy Center for Maternal Mental Health
Visionaries for the Future of Maternal Mental Health
Programs and results
What we aim to solve
One in five U.S. women will suffer from a mental health disorder during pregnancy or the postpartum period. Though the majority of them have health insurance coverage, only 15% will receive some form of treatment. Multiple barriers and solutions exist, that 2020 Mom has been instrumental in identifying and lifting up. These opportunities include: -Mental health provider shortages -Gaps in obstetrician provider training -Behavioral health insurance being "carve-out" of medical insurance -Need for care coordination/case management -Insurers declining qualified mental health providers access to their networks -Insurers dragging out or denying approval of appropriate care -Lack of measurement and accountability of providers delivering of a standard of care -Need for outpatient and inpatient hospital programs -Distrust of the health care system by Black/Brown mothers
Our programs
What are the organization's current programs, how do they measure success, and who do the programs serve?
The Maternal Mental Health FORUM
One of the ways 2020 Mom carries out our mission is by hosting the annual Maternal Mental Health FORUM to bring together change-makers including moms clinicians, researchers, policymakers, insurance leaders, hospital administrators, public health managers, and others to discover and discuss emerging considerations in pregnancy-related mental health. Since the first FORUM held in 2012, attendance has grown to nearly 1000 participants.
The goals for the FORUM are to mobilize cross-sector stakeholders through knowledge sharing; introduce successful strategies and impactful programs; and engage stakeholders in discussions about effective policies.
The event features leading researchers. Program developers, health care benefit payors, government leaders, and leaders from community-based organizations.
The convening informs, inspires, and connects people and ideas -all aimed at increasing the prevention, diagnosis, and treatment rates of these debilitating disorders.
TheBlueDotProject
TheBlueDotProject.org hosts the U.S.'s maternal mental health awareness campaign each May. TheBlueDot is the universal symbol of support and survivorship. The project attracts mothers, the general public, government agencies, and businesses as participants in its annual social media awareness campaign. In 2021, the campaign over 50 million impressions, growing by more than 50%.
Issue Briefs and Reports
2020 Mom is known as the go-to organization for information about barriers and solutions to improving the diagnosis and treatment of maternal mental health disorders. This includes understanding and collating complex information about health care policy, health and mental health care delivery and financing and federal and state law.
To that end, 2020 Mom researches and develops a bi-annual report titled the National State of Maternal Mental Health to document the latest research, policy, and advances in care, as well as case studies and an overview of parties actively advocating for change.
2020 Mom also develops issue briefs on solutions like, "Screening and Detection" and "Certified Peer Support Specialists," for example. These briefs and reports are shared via webinars, speaking engagements and via written communications like blog posts and infographics.
State and Federal Policy
We advance federal and state maternal mental health policy.
After convening a multi-stakeholder task force with the support of the legislature and private funders in California. 2020 Mom published the task force's report and national and state recommendations. This led 2020 Mom to sponsor and draft legislation which ultimately became the most comprehensive set of maternal mental health laws in the country.
We've propelled state advocacy change throughout the country through drafting model legislation, providing a toolkit for commissions and task forces, and launching our state agencies and non-profit organization leader fellows training programs.
This work has helped advance state policy in FL, UT, AZ, PR, MT, LA, TX and more.
2020 Mom is also leading federal policy efforts and was instrumental in passage of the Bringing Postpartum Depression Out of the Shadows Act, securing funding for the first HHS report to Congress, Introduction of the Moms Matter & TRIUMPH Acts.
Scaling Peer Support
Recognizing the value of mothers who have suffered from a mental health disorder, in supporting other mothers, 2020 Mom has served as a catalyst for professionalizing the field, and aims to integrate state-certified peer support specialists into community-based and obstetric settings. This is critical in supporting stigma reduction, augmenting behavioral health treatment shortages and expanding obstetric providers' capacity to educate expecting moms and to screen/detect these disorders. All states now have state-sanctioned peer support training and certification programs in place. Most state Medicaid agencies, but not all reimburse for mental health peer support. Our work includes piloting training and integration, researching state policy gaps and leading the related state policy work with applicable nonprofit partners, researching and sharing Medicaid/Insurance billing information, and developing a center of excellence to scale implementation.
Catalyzing Measurement of Screening and Suicide Rates
Until recently, the U.S. maternal mental health has largely fallen under the radar, with the exception of media coverage about postpartum depression. The true gravity of the problem in the U.S. was not understood, because there was no system for measuring:
(1) whether the healthcare system delivered a standard of care,
( 2) how many women were identified as suffering from a maternal mental health disorder by a health care professional,
(3) how many maternal suicides were happening
2020 Mom has propelled the development of new U.S. health care system measures to determine how many women have been screened/identified by a health care professional and whether they developed treatment plans/followed-up (HEDIS Measures).
Further, we have been working with the CDC to ensure maternal suicide rates are being reported, and have successfully advocated for national reporting.
We are tracking the roll-out and sharing the results and identifying barriers/pathways to improving the results.
Where we work
Affiliations & memberships
Independent Sector Member 2022
Mental Health Liaison Group 2022
MoMMas Voices 2022
External reviews
Photos
Videos
Our results
How does this organization measure their results? It's a hard question but an important one.
Evaluation documents
Download evaluation reportsNumber of people on the organization's email list
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Type of Metric
Output - describing our activities and reach
Direction of Success
Increasing
Number of convenings hosted by the organization
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Population(s) Served
Pregnant people, Young adults, Young women, Activists
Type of Metric
Output - describing our activities and reach
Direction of Success
Holding steady
Number of external speaking requests for members of the organization
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Population(s) Served
Pregnant people, Young women
Type of Metric
Output - describing our activities and reach
Direction of Success
Holding steady
Our Sustainable Development Goals
Learn more about Sustainable Development Goals.
Goals & Strategy
Reports and documents
Download strategic planLearn about the organization's key goals, strategies, capabilities, and progress.
Charting impact
Four powerful questions that require reflection about what really matters - results.
What is the organization aiming to accomplish?
Our vision is a health care system that routinely detects and treats maternal mental health disorders for every mother, every time. Our goals center around three focus areas: 1. Availability of Providers, 2. Appropriate Screening, and 3. Ample Coverage.
Availability of Providers
Goal: A broad range of qualified maternal mental health providers, so evidence-based care options are readily available to mothers in the U.S. This includes the use of state-certified peer support specialists who can support mothers emotionally through various modes, including text messaging and offer care coordination -assisting mothers with finding in-network mental health providers, for example. This also includes ensuring mental health insurers include adequate numbers of qualified maternal mental health providers in the network and promote and pay for provider-to-psychiatrist consultations. Additionally, mothers must have access to treatment programs along the continuum, not just a mental health office visit or the ER -inpatient treatment programs for mothers and outpatient hospital programs are needed.
Appropriate Screening (Testing)
Goal: Obstetric providers (Ob/Gyns, Midwives, and Family Practice Doctors) adopt a standard protocol for screening using research-validated testing like "screening" questionnaires. We believe that screening should occur early so interventions and care can be implemented quickly. We also believe that screening must be comprehensive to "do no harm" (i.e., incorrect diagnosis, prescribing harmful treatment, or inappropriately sending a mother to the ER). Mothers should be screened for the range of maternal mental health disorders, not just depression. This includes but isn't limited to anxiety, maternal OCD/"intrusive thoughts," and bipolar disorder in certain circumstances. Finally, measurement, reporting, and oversight must be in place to ensure appropriate screening is happening universally for all mothers.
Ample Coverage
Goal: Private insurers and Medicaid plans provide timely access to in-network providers and care without requiring mothers and those who support them to jump through hoops. This includes the promotion of payment reform to support mental health integration in obstetric/primary care and addressing benefit coverage limitations, utilization management prohibitions, and provider network restrictions.
What are the organization's key strategies for making this happen?
Our Strategies: The Four Cs. Our strategies are bucketed into four categories: 1. Craveable Content, 2. Communities of Practice, 3. Co-Laboratory Projects and Collaborations and 4.
Craveable Content
This strategy builds on 2020 Mom’s track record of curating and communicating cutting-edge content to those we serve. This content is centered around the development of issue briefs and bi-annual “State of Maternal Mental Health in America” reports. Distribution of such content occurs through our annual conference the "Maternal Mental Health FORUM" webinars, blogs, external conference presentations, infographics (including graphic illustrations), storytelling, and social media memes and messaging.
Communities of Practice
We connect change agents working to solve the same problems or who work in similar settings to learn how to close gaps in maternal mental health care efficiently, and together. These communities may include our state non-profit policy fellowship and state and territory public health fellowship programs and the further development of the maternal mental health LinkedIn groups, for example. Certain communities of practice may center around the adoption of the 2020 Mom “Whole Mom” hospital, insurer best practice standards, and checklists.
Co-Laboratory & Collaborations
Our Co-Laboratory is where implementation science comes to life. We experiment and test ideas with partners to find solutions that work (and don’t work). We iterate on learnings and promote wide-scale adoption of solutions that work. We collaborate with critical stakeholder organizations to support the adoption and scaling of solutions. Examples include our collaborations to lift up and propel the use of state-certified peer support specialists to close provider shortage gaps and provide women with just-in-time and welcoming support. Another example is our collaboration with the International OCD Foundation to develop resources for providers to better detect maternal OCD, and invest in research to improve diagnosis and treatment.
Commanding Action
Commanding Action means 2020 Mom will actively push for the adoption of solutions among stakeholder groups. Strategic tactics can include letters, petitions, legislative and legal solutions. Examples include 2020 Mom introducing and passing legislation in California to require obstetricians to screen, and introducing the TRIUMPH for New Moms Act in Congress that calls for the creation of a national strategic plan, coordination of federal agency resources and programs, and recommendations to governors and state legislatures on state-level policy solutions.
What are the organization's capabilities for doing this?
We understand the complex U.S. healthcare system.
We are skilled at research and writing and sharing complex problems in easy-to-understand framing.
We have a broad network of cross-sector partners and we are naturals at convening this network in conference and webinar settings.
We understand health policy including the regulatory (state and federal government agency) and statutory/legislative process.
We center the mother in all that we do by lifting up stories to paint a picture of complex problems and their solutions.
What have they accomplished so far and what's next?
We began this work in 2011 when maternal mental health was simply referred to as “postpartum depression” and when the healthcare system was silently failing tens of thousands of mothers and families in the U.S. a year.
In our first ten years, 2020 Mom was focused on introducing the problem and framing "maternal mental health" to key partners and the public. We also centered our work on identifying and sharing barriers and pathways to change.
Our approaches included:
engaging critical cross-sector stakeholders,
coalescing non-profit partners
identifying best practices
creating tools to support change-agents
launching and leading U.S. awareness campaigns
centering mother’s stories
advancing the narrative from postpartum depression to maternal mental health
laying the preliminary groundwork in federal and state policy
Our successes have included:
-Forming the National Coalition for Maternal Mental Health in 2014, which was instrumental in passing the Bringing Postpartum Depression out of the Shadows Act in 2016
-Launching the CA Taskforce on Maternal Mental Health, a multi-stakeholder group that studied and created a state strategic plan, which ultimately lead to private and public investments in maternal mental health and the passage of the most comprehensive state legislative package in the country.
-Creating the Insurer and Hospital "Whole Mom" standards for maternal mental health, which serve as a guidepost for easy and comprehensive action steps
-Hosting an annual FORUM, for cross-sector change agents, with nearly 1000 attendees annually
-Launching the first-ever maternal mental health online training program with our partner, Postpartum Support International, training
-Founding and incubating "Mom Congress" a membership and advocacy organization that aims to become the "AARP" of motherhood.
-Launching Maternal Mental Health Awareness Month in May in 2015, and hosting the annual social media awareness campaign through TheBlueDotProject with over 20 Million impressions on social media
-Creating and hosting the U.S Maternal Suicide Awareness and Action campaign in 2018, including urging the CDC to begin tracking maternal suicide rates and supporting additional state intervention.
How we listen
Seeking feedback from people served makes programs more responsive and effective. Here’s how this organization is listening.
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Who are the people you serve with your mission?
2020 Mom’s mission is to close gaps in maternal mental health care -and we ultimately seek to serve mothers. However, we directly serve cross-sector change agents with the power to close these gaps including providers, insurers/payors, community based organizations, community health workers (including doulas and peer support specialists) hospitals, state and federal agencies and law makers.
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How is your organization using feedback from the people you serve?
To identify bright spots and enhance positive service experiences, To inform the development of new programs/projects, To understand people's needs and how we can help them achieve their goals
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What significant change resulted from feedback?
We recently received feedback that in addition to looking at racial disadvantaged populations, we also consider giving more voice to mothers with disabilities, who are also at higher risk for experiencing maternal mental health disorders and having difficulting accessing care. As a result, we have included this population in our planning efforts for our next maternal mental health FORUM. Also, one population we directly serve is providers. We have mandated obstetricians test (aka screen) for maternal mental health disorders and also received feedback that one of the primary barriers is lack of reimbursement. We are now working with the federal agency CMS and private insurers to support reimbursement of obstetricians' time and effort to identify, treat and connect patients to care.
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Which of the following feedback practices does your organization routinely carry out?
We collect feedback from the people we serve at least annually, We take steps to get feedback from marginalized or under-represented people, We take steps to ensure people feel comfortable being honest with us, We look for patterns in feedback based on demographics (e.g., race, age, gender, etc.), We look for patterns in feedback based on people’s interactions with us (e.g., site, frequency of service, etc.), We engage the people who provide feedback in looking for ways we can improve in response, We act on the feedback we receive, We tell the people who gave us feedback how we acted on their feedback
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What challenges does the organization face when collecting feedback?
We don't have any major challenges to collecting feedback
Financials
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Operations
The people, governance practices, and partners that make the organization tick.
Connect with nonprofit leaders
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- Analyze a variety of pre-calculated financial metrics
- Access beautifully interactive analysis and comparison tools
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Connect with nonprofit leaders
SubscribeBuild relationships with key people who manage and lead nonprofit organizations with GuideStar Pro. Try a low commitment monthly plan today.
- Analyze a variety of pre-calculated financial metrics
- Access beautifully interactive analysis and comparison tools
- Compare nonprofit financials to similar organizations
Want to see how you can enhance your nonprofit research and unlock more insights? Learn More about GuideStar Pro.
Policy Center for Maternal Mental Health
Board of directorsas of 04/10/2023
Carole Mendoza
Voya
Term: 2020 - 2022
Britt Newton
Treasurer and Incoming Board Chair 2020 Mom; Sales AbbVie
Kobi Ajayi
Secretary, 2020 Mom; Doctoral Student, School of Public Health Texas A&M University
Alinne Barrera
Member at Large, 2020 Mom; Clinical Psychologist & Professor Palo Alto University
Jaime Cabrera
Member at Large, 2020 Mom; Executive Director Colorado Perinatal Quality Collaborative
Sheryl Connelly
Member at Large, 2020 Mom; Chief Futurist, Ford Motor Company
Jasper L Hendricks, III
Member at Large, 2020 Mom; Mom Congress Steering Committeel; Non Profit Consultant
Melanie Thomas
Member at Large, 2020 Mom; Medical Doctor -Psychaitrist; Faculty at the University of California at San Francisco
Board leadership practices
GuideStar worked with BoardSource, the national leader in nonprofit board leadership and governance, to create this section.
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Board orientation and education
Does the board conduct a formal orientation for new board members and require all board members to sign a written agreement regarding their roles, responsibilities, and expectations? Yes -
CEO oversight
Has the board conducted a formal, written assessment of the chief executive within the past year ? Yes -
Ethics and transparency
Have the board and senior staff reviewed the conflict-of-interest policy and completed and signed disclosure statements in the past year? Yes -
Board composition
Does the board ensure an inclusive board member recruitment process that results in diversity of thought and leadership? Yes -
Board performance
Has the board conducted a formal, written self-assessment of its performance within the past three years? Yes
Organizational demographics
Who works and leads organizations that serve our diverse communities? Candid partnered with CHANGE Philanthropy on this demographic section.
Leadership
The organization's leader identifies as:
The organization's co-leader identifies as:
Race & ethnicity
Gender identity
Sexual orientation
Disability
We do not display disability information for organizations with fewer than 15 staff.
Equity strategies
Last updated: 03/05/2022GuideStar partnered with Equity in the Center - an organization that works to shift mindsets, practices, and systems to increase racial equity - to create this section. Learn more
- We review compensation data across the organization (and by staff levels) to identify disparities by race.
- We ask team members to identify racial disparities in their programs and / or portfolios.
- We analyze disaggregated data and root causes of race disparities that impact the organization's programs, portfolios, and the populations served.
- We disaggregate data to adjust programming goals to keep pace with changing needs of the communities we support.
- We employ non-traditional ways of gathering feedback on programs and trainings, which may include interviews, roundtables, and external reviews with/by community stakeholders.
- We disaggregate data by demographics, including race, in every policy and program measured.
- We have long-term strategic plans and measurable goals for creating a culture such that one’s race identity has no influence on how they fare within the organization.
- We use a vetting process to identify vendors and partners that share our commitment to race equity.
- We have a promotion process that anticipates and mitigates implicit and explicit biases about people of color serving in leadership positions.
- We seek individuals from various race backgrounds for board and executive director/CEO positions within our organization.
- We have community representation at the board level, either on the board itself or through a community advisory board.
- We help senior leadership understand how to be inclusive leaders with learning approaches that emphasize reflection, iteration, and adaptability.
- We measure and then disaggregate job satisfaction and retention data by race, function, level, and/or team.
- We engage everyone, from the board to staff levels of the organization, in race equity work and ensure that individuals understand their roles in creating culture such that one’s race identity has no influence on how they fare within the organization.