Elevate’s Current Research and Evaluation Work

In collaboration with partners at the Charles B Wang Community Health Center in NYC, Elevate has completed a two-part pilot study to test a new cultural adaptation and linguistic translation of the MOMS Stress Management Course^SM for immigrant mothers of Chinese descent. In the first pilot, the adapted intervention was delivered through live-online classes to 89 mothers. Key indicators of feasibility, acceptability, and promise of effectiveness are currently being assessed.

In the next phase of our work, we will further adapt the MOMS Stress Management Course for U.S.-born mothers and test the feasibility and effectiveness of one or more cost-savings modifications, for example, decreased participation incentives and course delivery by one instructor instead of two.

This work is supported by the Robin Hood Foundation.

New York City DHS MOMS Partnership℠ (NYC DHS MOMS) began with the pilot implementation of the MOMS Partnership model and delivery of the MOMS Stress Management Course in two BronxWorks family shelters between 2021 – 2022 (Pilot 1). Pilot 2 expands NYC DHS MOMS through implementation and evaluation of the MOMS Stress Management Course in two family shelters operated by a second provider, CAMBA. In addition to testing the replicability of Pilot 1 results, Pilot 2 will test an alternative, “leaner” staffing model for NYC DHS MOMS (“comparison model”) intended to address staffing capacity issues identified in Pilot 1. Pilot 2 utilizes a cross-over design to assess the equivalence and non-inferiority of this comparison model.

This work is supported by the Robin Hood Foundation.

Building on the promising results of the Chinese cultural and linguistic adaptation of MOMS Stress Management Course^SM, Elevate is partnering with the New York City Department of Homeless Services (NYC DHS) and BronxWorks to complete a cultural adaptation of the MOMS Stress Management Course^SM for Spanish-speaking mothers.

Previously, Elevate worked with the NYC DHS to deliver the MOMS Stress Management Course to their clients in the BronxWorks shelters, after which individuals reported positive changes such as high satisfaction, a decrease in depressive and anxiety symptoms, a decrease in difficulty paying for certain basic needs, and an increase in overall social support. By culturally adapting the course for Spanish-speakers, a wider pool of participants who may benefit similarly opens, particularly in a community where there is a large gap in available mental health services. Elevate will collaborate with BronxWorks to evaluate key indicators of feasibility, acceptability, and promise of effectiveness of the culturally adapted course.

This work is supported by the Robin Hood Foundation.

To date, the MOMS Partnership model has been implemented and evaluated in seven sites.

Across these sites, the core features and components of the MOMS Partnership model were put into practice, but with flexibility and tailoring to the community and context. The major goal of the MOMS Partnership® Cross-Site Evaluation

is to derive key learnings from aggregated data to understand differences in “success” in implementing the MOMS Partnership model across sites. These learnings will be used to clarify where, for whom, and in which contexts the MOMS Partnership model is best suited. Further, the learnings derived through this project will help to define/refine “best practices” going forward, as Elevate partners with new sites to deliver the MOMS Partnership model.

“Success” will be defined using several outcomes, including enrollment and attendance rates, overall program satisfaction, participant-reported acquisition and usefulness of the skills taught in MOMS Stress Management Course classes and pre/post change in several mental health indicators.

To explain differences in these outcomes, we will examine cross-site variations in several predictors, and determine which predictors explain the most variance in outcomes including site and participant characteristics and implementation choices.

This work is supported by the Klingenstein Family Foundation.

Many effective mental health interventions fail to be widely adopted or translated into real-world social service systems. Given that mental health is critical to the meaningful uptake of social services, an understanding of how MOMS Partnership programming is perceived among participants and staff is essential to building an evidence base that informs policy and practice and improves the lives of those in need. The aim of this study is to explore the perceptions and experiences of mothers who participated in an eight-week manualized MOMS Stress Management Course^SM within their community. Semi-structured interviews with program participants at three different sites and qualitative analysis will be used to evaluate mothers’ perspective of the quality of the program, the knowledge they gained through participating, and the program factors they found least and most helpful during their time participating in programming.

This work is supported by the National Clinician Scholars Program and the Perigee Fund.