Local officials are continuing their efforts to reduce the number of Bartholomew County infants who die before their first birthday.

The infant mortality rate in Bartholomew County from 2019 to 2023 was 7.7 deaths per 1,000 live births, up slightly from 7 from 2018 to 2022 and 6.5 from 2016 to 2020, according to the most recent data available from Columbus Regional Health.

By comparison, Indiana’s rate was 6.7 over from 2019 to 2023. The U.S. rate hovered between 5.4 and 5.6 each year over that period and increased following the pandemic, according to final and provisional data from Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The infant mortality rate is the ratio of infant deaths per 1,000 live births. For the purposes of calculating the rate, an infant is defined as a baby less than 1 year of age. Researchers and policymakers often consider the infant mortality rate to be a barometer of the overall health of a community.

Local health officials generally opt to calculate the local rate in five-year intervals because Bartholomew County typically records fewer than 20 infant deaths each year — a threshold below which rates are considered statistically unstable.

“2019 was a very high year for (infant mortality) and the first year we were doing our community action year,” said Patty Pigman, an infant mortality prevention specialist at Healthy Communities. “Since then, we’ve seen a steady decrease. We don’t have 2024 data yet but are hopeful that we will see a marked decrease in our five-year aggregate once that data becomes available and 2019 drops out of the aggregate.”

Though considered statistically unstable, annual figures show that the county’s infant mortality rate has remained below its 2019 level for four consecutive years as local health officials continue to make progress toward federal targets by the end of the decade.

In 2023, the county’s annual infant mortality rate was 6.1, down from 7.1 in 2022 and 10.6 in 2019, according to figures provided by Columbus Regional Health. However, health officials urged caution in interpreting the annual figures.

Records from the Bartholomew County Health Department show that three infants died within the county lines in 2023, up from one death in 2022, but down from eight in 2019.

However, those figures may not paint a complete picture of infant mortality in Bartholomew County, as the local health department only tracks deaths that occur within the geographical boundaries of the county regardless of the infant’s county of residence.

For instance, infants who lived in Bartholomew County but died elsewhere would not be included in those figures, while infants who lived in another county but died in Bartholomew County would be included.

Local officials said many factors are likely contributing to the lower annual infant mortality rates in Bartholomew County in recent years, including efforts to prevent sleep-related deaths, an increase in early prenatal care, the Health First Indiana initiative, among other factors.

“In 2020, that’s when we began doing a lot of work around our sleep-related deaths,” said Patty Pigman, an infant mortality prevention specialist at Healthy Communities. “ We are seeing far fewer of those babies that are dying from what we call (sudden unexplained infant death). …For a time, it was zero in our county. We are not at that zero level anymore, but we are seeing far fewer in this five-year period than we did in the previous five-year period.”

Healthy People 2030

Additionally, the latest local data suggests that the county has continued to make progress toward the Healthy People 2030 goal of an infant mortality rate of 5. Healthy People 2030 is an initiative by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services seeking to boost population-level health and well-being.

In 2022, 15 states met the Health People 2030 target for infant mortality rate, according to the most recent update from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“I believe that we will be somewhere near that target for 2024 once our data comes out,” Pigman said. “It’s hard to say, because I really don’t have good live birth numbers for the county yet.”

The update from local officials comes after the Indiana Department of Health reported a “historic decline” in infant mortality in 2024.

Preliminary data from state officials suggest that infant deaths potentially declined to a record low in 2024. Last year, the infant mortality rate in Indiana was 6.3, down from 6.6 in 2023.

If the rate remains the same when finalized, it would be the lowest in Indiana since 1900, according to the Indiana Department of Health.

A more in-depth analysis of the preliminary data is expected to become available in the coming months as the data is finalized.

“We are ecstatic that more Hoosier babies are celebrating their first birthdays,” Indiana State Health Commissioner Lindsay Weaver said in a statement. “Seeing these efforts pay off is something to celebrate, and we are grateful to clinicians, healthcare centers and affiliates, local health departments and all our other partners for their collective efforts.”

Local efforts

Locally, one effort aimed at helping increase maternal and infant health is the Healthy Start Initiative, which is a program by the Indiana Rural Health Association that funded through the federal Health Resources and Services Administration.

Local officials have received grant funding to hire navigators at OB/GYN offices in Columbus, as well as a social worker and a community health worker to offer assistance during the early phases of pregnancy.

Some of that assistance includes connecting women to resources, including Medicaid, food and other resources to help with housing needs.

“It’s offering assistance as we can early on,” said Brandy Todd, a nurse and perinatal navigator at Columbus Regional Health. “…Just to offer the support they need to be successful as they go through pregnancy and then having that baby moving forward.”

Other local efforts include Daddy 101, a class that offers a space for fathers “to ask questions without mom,” which has seen an increase in attendance over the last couple of years, officials said.

Last year, 40 dads attended the course, up 50% compared to the year before, Pigman said. The class has been popular enough that “we’ve had to turn people away and put them on a wait list a couple different times this year,” she said.

Pigman, for her part, said she expects infant mortality to continue being a local priority for the foreseeable future.

“The reality is we’re never going to get to a zero, because there are facts about biology that we will always have some form of infant mortality,” Pigman said. “But if we can get to a point where we are no longer seeing preventable deaths, I think that that would be huge.”
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