Improving Access to Maternal Health Care in Rural Communities

CMS has aligned health policies to its Rural Health Strategy and its new Rethinking Rural Health Initiative and released its first Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) Scorecard to evaluate state progress on maternal health outcomes. This was published in Fall 2019 in preparation for implementing the recently enacted Improving Access to Maternity Care Act and Preventing Maternal Deaths Act. This issue brief was developed by CMS to provide background information on the scope of this problem and to focus attention on the need for national, state, and community-based organizations to collaborate on developing an action plan to improve access to maternal health care and improve outcomes for rural women and their babies.