For some families in rural Alaska, accessing health care after childbirth isn’t as easy as visiting the nearest clinic. Getting there may require a boat ride, a small plane or hours of travel on remote roads. 

The challenges extend beyond geography. High health care costs, limited transportation and childcare options, non-traditional work schedules and a shortage of local providers with expertise in reproductive health can all make it harder for families to get the care they need. 

For new parents, those barriers can have serious consequences. The year after a baby is born is a critical time for physical and mental health, including risks such as postpartum depression and anxiety.  

The Kachemak Bay Family Planning Clinic is working to change that. With a first-year award of more than $727,000 from the federal Rural Health Transformation Program, the Homer-based clinic is launching Bridging the Distance, a five-year pilot effort to expand remote maternal and reproductive health services across the Kenai Peninsula. 

The clinic is partnering with the Johns Hopkins Center for Communication Programs to help understand community needs, strengthen the approaches being tested and identify lessons that could inform other rural health efforts. 

“The Kachemak Bay team is already doing incredible work,” says researcher Danielle Naugle, PhD, who is leading the effort for CCP. “Our job is to gather feedback from the clinic, clients, and the community to help shape the evolution and expansion of the programs.” 

The Kachemak Bay clinic is one of only three dedicated reproductive health providers in Alaska and serves communities across the region through its Homer clinic, telehealth appointments, mail-out services and pop-up clinics that bring care closer to where people live. 

The first year of the pilot will expand those pop-up reproductive health clinics and launch a new postpartum home visiting program designed to bring care directly to families who may face significant barriers to reaching a clinic. 

“Reproductive health care, especially for new moms in the year after birth, can be hard to talk about and hard to reach in Alaska,” says Claudia Haines, CEO of the Kachemak Bay Family Planning Clinic. “This funding will help us reduce preventable maternal physical and mental health conditions, support healthy birth spacing and family planning, and provide healthcare that meets people where they are – literally.” 

CCP will work alongside the clinic to understand how these services are experienced by the people who use them and how they can be improved over time. Through interviews, community input and implementation research, the team will help identify what families need, what the clinic can provide and what other rural communities might learn from the effort. 

One focus of the work is the clinic’s pop-up reproductive health clinics, which bring services such as contraception, STI testing, cancer screenings and counseling to communities where access can be limited. CCP will help explore what people value about these clinics, what additional needs they identify and how the approach can evolve as the clinic considers expanding its reach. 

The project also includes a new postpartum home visiting program. Doulas and registered nurses will provide care to first-time parents in their homes, sometimes traveling by boat or small plane to reach families in remote areas. 

The project’s third component focuses on building connections among reproductive health providers across Alaska. CCP will help map providers and support learning opportunities where organizations can share experiences and learn from one another across a state where distance can make collaboration challenging. 

As the pilot unfolds, CCP will work alongside the clinic to understand the experiences of families and providers and help share lessons from the work.  

“Beyond inspiration, we hope to provide practical tools to support other rural health providers to launch similar initiatives in their own communities,” Naugle says.