FLOURISH recently participated in the 2019 Code With A Cause, a 48-hour hackathon event that benefits chosen nonprofit organizations in the Greater St. Louis region. Our Infant Health Action Team presented a need for an accessible, user-friendly inventory tool for our portable crib provider network. This tool would enable the network to better connect families in need with cribs and safe sleep education.
Unsafe sleep practices are the leading cause of sudden infant deaths. St. Louis’ rates are three times greater than the national average, and Black babies are almost four times more likely to die in their sleep than White babies. FLOURISH currently partners with more than a dozen safe sleep providers to provide safe sleep education and equip families with cribs. If a partner agency runs out of cribs, it’s hard for them to know where to refer the family. There currently is no easy way to know who has cribs available or what other partner agencies’ eligibility criteria are, causing a longer wait time for families.
The implementation of this new online tool will allow portable crib partner agencies to:
- Track crib inventory, eligibility criteria and availability across the whole network
- Match families’ eligibility qualifications with the available programs
- Refer families to the correct provider
- Access a shared calendar for upcoming safe sleeping education classes
This new comprehensive online tool, available to existing and new portable crib providers and is user-friendly to desktop and mobile phone users, will be launched by early summer.
For more information on safe sleep and safe sleep resources, visit the safe sleep guidelines on our website.
