Ask the Expert: FIMR & PPOR: Amazing Data Processes to Help Healthy Start Sites Improve Population Health

Fetal and Infant Mortality Review (FIMR) is a community-owned and action oriented process to improve service systems and resources for women, infants and families.  This evidence based process examines fetal and infant deaths, determines preventability, and engages community to take action. The focus of FIMR is to determine system gaps that contributed to the fetal or infant death.

Perinatal Periods of Risk (PPOR) is a comprehensive approach to help communities use data to reduce infant mortality. Designed for use in US cities with high infant mortality rates, PPOR brings community stakeholders together to build consensus and partnership based on local data. PPOR provides an analytic framework and steps for investigating and addressing the specific local causes of high fetal and infant mortality rates and disparities.  Initial analyses are based only on vital records data (births, deaths, and fetal deaths); later steps utilize all available sources of data and information.