Talk:March of Dimes

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Merge Proposal
Legal Status and Organization More than 3 million volunteers support the March of Dimes in local communities.

Services March of Dimes volunteers and staff work on a bipartisan basis at federal and state levels to advocate for programs to improve the health of pregnant women, babies, and children such as expanded newborn screening and greater access to health care insurance.

Polio Patient Aid In the years between 1938 and the approval of the Salk vaccine in 1955, the foundation spent $233 million on polio patient care. In order to serve the entire community and not just the poor, the national office told local chapters that while families were expected to do what they reasonably could financially, the foundation would pay for the cost that could not be met without suffering undue hardship. This policy resulted in more than 80 percent of polio patients in the U.S. receiving significant foundation aid.

Virginia Apgar, M.D. While with the March of Dimes, Apgar played a crucial role in the foundation’s campaign for immunization against rubella, promoted the establishment of birth defect registries, and advocated for making genetic and pregnancy history a part of medical record-keeping for every pregnant woman.

Genetics The annual “Short Course in Medical and Experimental Mammalian Genetics” was founded in 1960 as a collaboration between The Jackson Laboratory in Bar Harbor, Maine, and Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, with funding from the March of Dimes. The two-week summer course covered all aspects of genetics in relation to health and disease from molecular to populations. Geneticist Victor A. McKusick, M.D. who authored Mendelian Inheritance in Man, created and directed the program, which he intended to fill a gap in existing medical genetics education. March of Dimes continues to sponsor the course, which is held each summer at The Jackson Laboratory in Bar Harbor, Maine.

In 1970, McKusick convinced the March of Dimes to fund the creation of a map of the human genome. The U.S. government got involved in 1985, and in 1988, the Human Genome Organization (HUGO) was established to pursue gene-mapping research, with McKusick as its first president.

Newborn Intensive Care Units & NICU Family Support® Program In 2001, the March of Dimes introduced a comprehensive national program to provide comfort, support, and information to families with sick or premature babies in the NICU. The NICU Family Support® program, which is implemented at local health care facilities through March of Dimes state chapters, includes educational materials and support groups to connect parents with others who have had a child in the NICU, as well as a professional development component to help NICU staff work effectively with patients’ families. The March of Dimes also created ShareYourStory.org, an online community for NICU families.

Pulmonary Surfactant/Nitric Oxide In February 2000, the New England Journal of Medicine published a study coauthored by March of Dimes-funded researcher John P. Kinsella, M.D., that found that babies unable to breathe properly due to high blood pressure in their lungs can avoid treatment with heart-lung machines by receiving small, early doses of inhaled nitric oxide. Kinsella, who was part of the Clinical Inhaled Nitric Oxide Research Group, received March of Dimes support from 1993-1996 to study the vital role of nitric oxide in the regulation of blood flow in the lungs. In 1999, nitric oxide was approved by the FDA for use “in term and near-term infants with hypoxic respiratory failure requiring ventilatory support who have clinical and/or echocardiographic evidence of PPHN.”

Folic Acid Campaign A component of the campaign aimed at improving folic acid intake among Hispanic women of childbearing age was introduced by March of Dimes in 2001.

In addition to educational efforts, the March of Dimes website states that the organization supports research grants to improve understanding of how folic acid prevents NTDs.

March of Dimes is currently a member of the National Council on Folic Acid and serves on the steering committee.

Annual Gallup Surveys From 1995 to 2007, The Gallup Organization, supported by funding from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), conducted an annual national survey of women’s knowledge and behaviors on folic acid for the March of Dimes.

The CDC analyzed the results of the March of Dimes Gallup surveys conducted from 2003 to 2007. Findings of that analysis included that among all women of childbearing age, those aged 18-24 years had the least awareness regarding folic acid consumption (61%), the least knowledge regarding when folic acid should be taken (6%), and the lowest reported daily use of supplements containing folic acid (30%). Because women in this age group account for nearly one-third of all births in the United States, CDC recommended that promotion of folic acid consumption be targeted to this population.

The most recent survey (2007) reported that only 40 percent of women of childbearing age in the United States take a vitamin with folic acid daily, with only 12 percent realizing that it should be taken before pregnancy. The 2007 results were derived from telephone interviews with a national sample of 2,003 women aged 18 to 45. ToddPreston (talk) 13:41, 29 July 2011 (UTC)

New Information To Be Added
New Born Screening According to a presentation at the 2005 annual meeting of the American Public Health Association, individual, state-based March of Dimes chapters work with governors, state legislators, health departments, health professionals, and parents to improve state newborn screening programs and to make comprehensive newborn screening programs available to every newborn throughout the country.

Prematurity Campaign In 2008, the Prematurity Campaign was extended by the Board of Trustees until 2020, and global targets were set for prematurity prevention.

For the first time in more than 30 years, in 2010 the United States saw its first two-year decline in the preterm birth rate.

Prematurity Awareness Month/Day In 2003, March of Dimes designated November as Prematurity Awareness Month, and each year, a single day in November is designated Prematurity Awareness Day. These designations are part of an annual campaign to raise public awareness about the seriousness of prematurity and the importance of a healthy pregnancy. On Prematurity Awareness Day, the March of Dimes issues its annual Premature Birth Report Card, which grades the nation and each individual state on preterm birth rates. The first report card was issued in 2008.

White Paper on Prematurity In 2009, the March of Dimes partnered with the Department of Reproductive Health and Research of the World Health Organization (RHR/WHO) to publish a white paper on the global and regional toll of preterm birth worldwide. This report, which was the first attempt to identify the global scope of premature births and related infant deaths, found that an estimated 13 million infants worldwide are born premature each year and more than one million of them die in their first month of life. Further, premature births account for 9.6 percent of total births and for 28 percent of newborn deaths. The highest rates of premature birth are in Africa, followed by North America (Canada and the United States combined). March for Babies According to the March of Dimes, March for Babies is held in more than 900 communities across the nation. Every year, 1 million people—including 20,000 company teams, family teams and national sponsors—participate in the event, which has raised more than $1.8 billion since 1970. The March for Babies website states that “family teams walk to celebrate, honor or remember the babies and children who have touched their lives.” Sherri Shepherd, co-host of ABC’s “The View,” celebrity ambassador for the March for Babies and mother to a premature child, kicked off the 2010 March for Babies by ringing the opening bell of the New York Stock Exchange.

The March of Dimes states that seventy-six cents of every dollar raised in March for Babies is spent on research and programs to help prevent premature birth, birth defects and infant mortality.

Bikers for Babies March of Dimes’ Bikers for Babies is a motorcycle ride that raises money to fund research grants focused on issues related to premature birth and community programs for families of premature babies. Bikers for Babies rides were held in 33 communities around the nation in 2010. Dee Snider, lead singer for Twisted Sister, served as the 2010 national spokesperson for Bikers for Babies.

Sounds of Pertussis Once rare in the United States, cases of pertussis (whooping cough) are appearing across the country with greater frequency. To address this issue, the March of Dimes and Sanofi Pasteur launched a national education campaign in 2010 called “Sounds of Pertussis” to raise awareness about the seriousness of pertussis and the need for adult vaccination to prevent infecting babies. NASCAR driver Jeff Gordon is a national spokesperson for the campaign. The campaign recently sponsored a song-writing contest called Sound Off About Pertussis, which was won by Maria Bennett with her original song, “Give Pertussis a Whooping.”

Perinatal Data Center According to the March of Dimes website, its Perinatal Data Center “works collaboratively with professional colleagues to conduct epidemiologic analyses and to translate findings into new insights.” In 2009, the American Journal of Epidemiology published a key study in which the center participated. Researchers found that the widespread use of fertility drugs probably plays a larger role than previously realized in the problem of premature birth in the United States. The study found that 4.6 percent of live births in 2005 resulted from the use of fertility drugs. Almost 23 percent of babies born as multiples were conceived using fertility drugs alone.

Other initiatives of the March of Dimes Perinatal Data Center include the PeriStats Web site, which provides free access to U.S., state, county, and city maternal and infant health data. BlairVanderbeek (talk) 15:09, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Information Merge
Salk Institute for Biological Studies Partly funded by the March of Dimes, the Salk Institute for Biological Studies was established in La Jolla, Calif., in the 1960s by Jonas Salk, M.D. The purpose of the Salk Institute was to provide a place for biologists and other scientists to collaborate on research into the basic principles of life, as well as consider the wider implications of their discoveries for the future of humanity and disease prevention. Today, the Salk Institute conducts biomedical research in 60 laboratories and employs a faculty of 61, with a scientific staff of more than 850. The March of Dimes continues to provide financial support to the Salk Institute.

Perinatal Health By the 1970s, the March of Dimes focus on birth defects and infant mortality began to broaden to include premature birth and low birth weight. March of Dimes began funding medical services grants for neonatal intensive care, genetic counseling and perinatal networks, as well as training of medical professionals in prenatal evaluation and care of high-risk pregnancies. Dr. Apgar played a role in convening the Committee on Perinatal Health that published Toward Improving the Outcome of Pregnancy (TIOP), a model for the regionalization of perinatal health care.

Fetal Alcohol Syndrome The term “fetal alcohol spectrum disorders” (FASDs) now is used to describe the many problems associated with alcohol exposure before birth, which affects up to 40,000 babies each year in the United States. Various CDC studies report that 0.2 to 1.5 FASD cases occur for every 1,000 live births in certain areas of the United States. According to the March of Dimes website, the organization’s current activities to prevent FASDs include education of the general public, teenagers, adults of childbearing age and expectant mothers about the dangers of alcohol and other drugs to their unborn children. Additionally, March of Dimes continues to provide grant funding to scientists investigating the influence of alcohol on pregnancy.

Fragile X Syndrome In 1991, an international research team at Emory University supported by an initial grant from the March of Dimes and headed by human geneticist Stephen Warren, Ph.D., identified the gene responsible for Fragile X (FMR1) by comparing differences in genes in children with fragile X to those being sequenced in the National Institutes of Health’s Human Genome Project. In people with Fragile X, a defect in FMR1 shuts the gene down, so it cannot manufacture the protein that it normally makes. Fragile X syndrome is the most common inherited cause of mental retardation and the most common known cause of autism. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Fragile X is estimated to affect 1 in 4,000 males and 1 in 6,000 females of all races and ethnic groups.

Food Fortification with Folic Acid The March of Dimes and its partners also urged the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to require the addition of folic acid to enriched grain products such as breads, cereals, flours, pastas, and rice. As a result, the folic acid fortification program, which required the addition of 140 micrograms of folic acid per 100 grams of grain to enriched grain foods, was initiated in 1998. A 2005 study published by researchers from the CDC reported that folic acid fortification of grain foods was associated with a one-third decline in neural tube defects between 1995 and 2002.

Newborn Screening In 2005, only 38 percent of infants were born in states that required screening for 21 or more of 29 core conditions recommended by the American College of Medical Genetics; but by 2009, all 50 states and the District of Columbia required screening for 21 or more of these treatable disorders.

Prematurity Awareness Month/Day In 2003, March of Dimes designated November as Prematurity Awareness Month, and each year, a single day in November is designated Prematurity Awareness Day. These designations are part of an annual campaign to raise public awareness about the seriousness of prematurity and the importance of a healthy pregnancy. On Prematurity Awareness Day, the March of Dimes issues its annual Premature Birth Report Card, which grades the nation and each individual state on preterm birth rates. The first report card was issued in 2008.

Healthy Babies are Worth the Wait® In 2007, the March of Dimes, the Johnson & Johnson Pediatric Institute, and the Kentucky Department for Public Health partnered with six Kentucky hospitals to launch “Healthy Babies Are Worth the Wait®,” a health promotion and prematurity prevention initiative intended to reduce the rate of preventable preterm births in targeted areas of Kentucky. The primary goal of Healthy Babies Are Worth the Wait is a 15 percent reduction in the rate of singleton (one baby) preterm births in these targeted areas.

SCHIP Reauthorization Established in 1997, the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) provides health insurance to 11 million low-income children and pregnant women. When the SCHIP bill came up for reauthorization in 2007, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), the National Association of Children's Hospitals (NACH), and March of Dimes partnered to urge Congress to pass the bill. It passed both the House of Representatives and Senate, but President Bush vetoed it twice.

In 2009, the bill was again presented for Congressional vote. AAP, NACH and March of Dimes again supported the reauthorization of SCHIP. The organizations called for strengthened coverage for pregnant women and children, identifying several key priorities to be addressed in the reauthorization. President Obama authorized expanding SCHIP coverage from 7 million to 11 million youngsters in February, 2009.

Signature Chefs Auction Held in communities across the U.S., Signature Chefs Auction fundraising events are comprised of a reception featuring the signature dishes of 15 to 25 local chefs and caterers. The events include a silent auction, and participating chefs also donate a package to be sold during a live auction. Money raised from these events goes toward grants for local health departments, research and educational materials for mothers. According to the March of Dimes, Signature Chef Auctions are held in more than 200 cities across the country and have raised more than $132 million since 1989. ToddPreston (talk) 15:34, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

Proposed Merge
Fragile X Syndrome Nobel Laureate James D. Watson, co-discoverer of the structure of DNA, stated Warren and colleagues’ discovery was “the first major human triumph of the Genome Project.” It has also been described as the first step toward treatments for Fragile X Syndrome. PREEMIE Act / 2008 Surgeon General’s Conference on Preterm Birth March of Dimes advocated successfully for the enactment of the PREEMIE Act in 2006, a law authorizing funding to expand research, surveillance and projects to investigate and prevent the causes of preterm birth. At a hearing in May 2010, the March of Dimes was one of several organizations who urged Congress to reauthorize the PREEMIE Act, which is due to expire in 2011. Legislation was introduced in September, 2010, to continue federal support for research, education and services addressing preterm birth by reauthorizing the PREEMIE Act.

The PREEMIE Act in 2006 led to the 2008 Surgeon General’s Conference on Preterm Birth, which established a national agenda for activities to reduce the preterm birth rate in the U.S. It also resulted in expanded research activities at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

March of Dimes Prize in Developmental Biology First given in 1996, the annual March of Dimes Prize in Developmental Biology is awarded each year to investigators whose work contributes to the understanding and prevention of birth defects. The Prize consists of a cash award of $250,000 and a silver medal in the design of the Roosevelt dime.

Previous recipients: 2010 – Shinya Yamanaka 2009 – Kevin P. Campbell and Louis M. Kunkel 2008 – Philip A. Beachy and Clifford J. Tabin 2007 – Anne McLaren and Janet Rossant 2006 – Alexander Varshavsky 2005 – Mario R. Capecchi* and Oliver Smithies* 2004 – Mary F. Lyon 2003 – Pierre Chambon and Ronald M. Evans* 2002 – Seymour Benzer and Sydney Brenner* 2001 – Corey S. Goodman and Thomas M. Jessell 2000 – H. Robert Horvitz* 1999 – Sir Martin J. Evans and Sir Richard L. Gardner 1998 – Davor Solter 1997 – Walter J. Gehring and David S. Hogness 1996 – Ralph L. Brinster and Beatrice Mintz
 * These five recipients have gone on to win the Nobel Prize.

Be a Hero for Babies Day Sponsored by Farmers Insurance, "Be a Hero for Babies Day" annually raises at least $2 million dollars in a single day for the March of Dimes. Farmers Insurance started "Be a Hero for Babies Day" in 2006, when then-CEO Paul Hopkins challenged Farmers Insurance agents and employees to raise $1 million dollars in one day for the March of Dimes. Events are held annually, with Farmers' agents' offices across the country serving as official March of Dimes repositories for people who wish to donate. The July, 2010 Be a Hero for Babies Day event raised more than $2.65 million.

Alliances March of Dimes has a number of national service partners who sponsor community educational programs and fundraising events that support the March of Dimes mission. For example, Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity has partnered with March of Dimes for more than 25 years on Project Alpha, which provides education and guidance to thousands of male teens, while Zeta Phi Beta has sponsored the Stork’s Nest program to promote prenatal care participation and healthy behaviors during pregnancy since 1972. According to the March of Dimes website, these organizations include Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc.; Builders Club; Circle K international; Family, Career and Community Leaders of America (FCCLA); Future Business Leaders Of America - Phi Beta Lambda (FBLA-PBL); Key Club; Kiwanis International; Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity, Inc.; Sigma Gamma Rho; The Top Ladies of Distinction, Inc.; United Auto Workers (UAW); Zeta Phi Beta Sorority, Inc.; and Operation Shower.

Volunteer Leadership Institute The March of Dimes’ first Volunteer Leadership Conference, focused on training volunteers and developing the organization’s commitment to the birth defects mission, was held at the Salk Institute in La Jolla, Calif., in the ‘60s. Today called the Volunteer Leadership Institute, this program provides training programs, resources and initiatives to key volunteer leaders, such as chapter and division board members. BlairVanderbeek (talk) 15:18, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

Example of what is wrong with the article, neutrality, form, example farm
The section March_of_Dimes leads one to believe that the March of Dimes was key to eliminating polio. While this may be true, what an encyclopedia is supposed to do is find is reliable, third-party, published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy that would analyze the organization's work and impact. Many sections in this article are written in this same way, thus the tag Template:Example farm tag over the article. The sections make one think "o well isn't that nice that the March of Dimes was instrumental in doing that" without having any reliable, third-party, published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy saying it explicitly. That is a clear WP:NPOV violation in my mind. It is clearly non-neutral in form. Jesanj (talk) 16:23, 14 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Agreed, these laundry lists of accomplishments have to go. They should be pared down to single reliably sourced prose sections.  The article as it currently stands is non neutral, I'm going to tag it as such. -- Daniel  16:26, 14 October 2011 (UTC)


 * I read through the content being discussed, March_of_Dimes and made some edits, removing the parts I viewed as non-neutral. Thoughts? BlairVanderbeek (talk) 16:46, 14 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Now the connection between Jonas Salk and March of Dimes is unclear. It currently reads as praise by association.  "March of Dimes wanted to eliminate polio, someone developed a vaccine, polio was eliminated."  Do you see how this is problematic? -- Daniel  16:54, 14 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Oh, yes. I do see that! Am I correct in saying that from the information beginning with Jonas Salk should be removed? Leaving only the opening paragraph. BlairVanderbeek (talk) 16:59, 14 October 2011 (UTC)
 * It should definitely be removed if there aren't reliable sources directly linking Salk with MoD. -- Daniel 17:01, 14 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Agreed! The Salk information has been removed. BlairVanderbeek (talk) 17:15, 14 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Do we all agree that this situation has been resolved? Does everyone agree it is ok to remove the neutrality box, since the discussion started around the section March_of_Dimes has been edited? BlairVanderbeek (talk) 15:17, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, didn't see your comment here and I replied here. But no. Jesanj (talk) 01:10, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

Style
The opening paragraph refers to the founding by "then president" Franklin D. Roosevelt. The "then" is superfluous and should only be used when referring to a prior office that was not the holder's highest. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.117.68.128 (talk) 15:05, 14 September 2012 (UTC)

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