March of Dimes Foundation

Target demographics: Moms, babies and all families regardless of wealth, race, gender, sexual orientation, or geography

Geographic areas served: United States

Programs: March of Dimes leads the fight for the health of all moms and babies. We fund research, education, and advocacy, and provide programs and services to give every family the best possible start. Since 1938, we’ve built a successful legacy to support every pregnant person and every family. Programs: Today, March of Dimes addresses the maternal and infant health crisis that American families face. The need has never been greater, and our community unites to be there for families throughout their pregnancy journeys. Every day we work to advance our efforts to end maternal health risks and death, end preterm birth and infant death, and close the health equity gap for every mom and baby. With 1 in 10 babies born too soon each year and two women dying from pregnancy and childbirth complications every day, we fund research to determine the causes and preventions of preterm birth and help more moms have healthy, full-term pregnancies. Groundbreaking strides were made in 2023 at our five Prematurity Research Centers (PRCs) at Stanford University, the Ohio Collaborative, University of Pennsylvania, Imperial College London, and University of California, San Francisco. Breakthroughs included the creation of predictive models for assessing the risk of preterm birth, preeclampsia, and other complications with unparalleled accuracy. Additionally, promising initial trials began for a microbiota supplement tailored for individuals at high risk of preterm birth. Our teams have also undertaken the development of a comprehensive database to illuminate the intricate connections between environmental exposures and recurrent pregnancy loss and miscarriage, paving the way for targeted interventions and improved maternal and infant health outcomes. March of Dimes supports some of the brightest doctors, scientists, academics, and computational experts in the world through our four research grants and two career awards. In 2023, we awarded $5.3 million to individuals pursuing transformative translational discoveries aimed at drastically improving the health of pregnant people and their babies. We recently launched our first ever research-based podcast, MODCAST, which brings scientists, doctors, donors, and families behind the laboratory doors for a fascinating look into the science that is changing, study by study, the story of moms and babies in the US. We also continue our commitment to fight for families with the March of Dimes Innovation Fund, a venture philanthropy initiative to invest donated funds in early-stage companies working to address the most pressing maternal and infant health challenges. Since launching, we’ve raised $6.75 million for the fund and engaged with a total of 320 companies of interest. Maternal and infant health outcomes remain at crisis levels, but for moms and babies of color, the situation is more dire. A 2023 Centers of Disease Control and Prevention report shows that 1 in 3 women reported experiencing discrimination during maternity care, with rates soaring to 40% among Black birthing people. March of Dimes leads efforts to address racial disparities in maternal and infant health. Through initiatives like the Mom and Baby Action Network (M-BAN)—a consortium of over 400 national, state, and local partners dedicated to addressing inequities in mom and baby health through five shared strategies—and the recently launched Research Center for Advancing Health Equity in Philadelphia, PA, we work to mitigate bias and reduce disparities in maternal healthcare through training and education. Additionally, over 140 local organizations reached nearly 6,000 people through Collective Impact (CI), a model for solving complex social problems. These CI activities, meetings, and conferences across the country focus efforts on key drivers and root causes of infant mortality, preterm birth, maternal mortality, and severe maternal morbidity. Our Professional Education team ignites necessary change by delivering 11,626 implicit bias training seats to healthcare professionals (including 652 students), with 98% confirming the training met its objectives and 93% saying it will benefit their practice. They also delivered 12,604 seats of other professional education trainings. With CDC funding, over 1,000 healthcare professionals nationwide received free beyond labels training on reducing stigma related to maternal mental health and substance use disorder. This contributed to training 24,230 healthcare professionals in 2023. Our Consumer Education platform, It Starts With Mom, expanded its reach to help even more women in need, with publications available in both Spanish and English. The It Starts With Mom Live webinars received over 778,000 views—a 200% increase from 2022. Itstartswithmom.org also received over 11,300 visits. Prenatal care, education, and social support are pregnancy essentials—and we continued bringing them where they were most needed with Supportive Pregnancy Care®, adding nine new sites for a total of 44 active group prenatal care programs across the country. Forty-eight professionals were trained at five of the new sites in 2023, with additional trainings and new sites scheduled to onboard. As the leading nonprofit voice in maternal and infant health, our reports highlight key markers to convey the reality of the unacceptable outcomes we see in this country. The 2023 March of Dimes Report Card showed the US preterm birth rate remains at a decade-long high, earning the nation a D+ grade for the second consecutive year. One factor in the maternal and infant health crisis is that over 5.5 million women of childbearing age in the US live in counties with limited or no access to maternity care. Our Nowhere to Go: Maternity Care Deserts Across the US (2024 Report) highlighted the worsening state of maternity care access across the country, a situation driven by recent hospital closures and reductions in obstetric services. Throughout the year, we advocate for families through campaigns like March for Change, with 74 state bills signed into law in 2023. A major policy win that resulted from our lobbying was the extension of Medicaid postpartum coverage to 12 months in 47 states and Washington, DC. At the federal level, we successfully lead efforts toward the strong bipartisan passage of our top legislative priorities the Preemie Reauthorization Act and the Preventing Maternal Deaths Reauthorization Act. We also advocate for critical legislation on stillbirth prevention—the Maternal And Child Health Stillbirth Prevention Act and the Shine For Autumn Act. Our Advocacy Network is an essential tool for everyone to use their voice to help us fight for families. Through the network, advocates receive action alerts and up-to-date information on laws and policies that will help in their communities. In 2023, we increased the network by nearly 8% with 46,899 advocates and 120,000 total actions taken, with 14,413 advocates who contacted officials and 119,317 total actions taken. Pregnancies don’t always go as expected. That’s why NICU Family Support® was offered in more than 70 NICU sites across the us to over 50,000 families, providing family education, staff training on patient-centered care, and an improved patient experience with the support of March of Dimes experts. We also provided each site with five new elearning courses, including one new topic focused on supporting NICU moms through the fourth trimester. Too many pregnant people don’t have access to care. Nearly 2,000 patients received quality perinatal healthcare through over 4,000 patient visits in Mom & Baby Mobile Health Centers in three sites. Our health centers aim to improve birth outcomes by addressing access issues and social drivers of health, while providing wraparound clinical and community services (e.g. housing, nutrition). March of Dimes currently has Mom and Baby Mobile Health Centers in Tucson, AZ; Phoenix, AZ; Columbus, OH; Washington, DC; and New York, NY. We’re working to launch additional centers soon in Houston, TX; Cleveland, OH; Southeast, OH; Birmingham, AL; and in Arizona where it will serve a Tribal population. Our flagship fundraising event, March for Babies, brought together more than 45,000 participants from across the country in 2023 to raise $26 million, and our special events raised more than $20 million to support the march of dimes mission. Every March of Dimes supporter, advocate, and family is the driving force behind our work to ensure that every family is healthy today and for generations to come. And together, we’ll continue to champion the health of all moms, babies, and families.