Essay on WIC (Women, Infant, and Children) Program: Pregnant Women With Anemia

WIC (Women, Infant, and Children) program has helped improve the health of women, infant, and children at high risk of nutritional related issues such as anemia. Various researches conducted by FNS and other governmental bodies indicate that WIC has been one of the most successful programs. Since its initiation in 1974, the program has earned a significant reputation as one of the most prosperous federally-funded programs in the United States of America.1 A collection of reviews, findings, and reports published indicate that WIC is also cost effective in protecting and promoting the health status of the low-income earning women, infant, and children. The eligibility for enrollment into WIC program is an income of 185% below the poverty line. When enrolled in the program, other than the nutritional education and referral to health agencies, WIC provides supplemental foods through voucher and electronic benefits transfer (EBT) cards that can be used to buy food at any authorized grocery. Over time, the program has issued food to the women, infants, and children through paper food vouchers but this is expected to change in the coming years to cover a larger geographical area.2 By 2020, WIC is projected to implement and use EBT entirely.

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Measuring either the mothers hemoglobin or the hematocrit concentration can help detect the presence of anemia or iron deficiency when enrollment to the program. This will contribute to give the pregnant women the required food supplements with iron. Among the women and children, the value of hemoglobin changes with age, overall lifestyle, pregnancy stage, and their individual attitude. During pregnancy, however, the value of hemoglobin often falls to the lowest point as a result of the expanded blood volume. Research studies indicate that pregnant women, children, and infants participating in WIC have a lower prevalence of anemia as compared to those not enrolled in the program.3 Subsequently, children whose mothers participated in the program during pregnancy have better vocabulary test scores as compared to the children whose mothers neglected the program. Since the low income, pregnant women are at risk for iron deficiency and hence anemia, and it is recommended to participate in the program to help mitigate anemia. This is because iron is one nutrient targeted in the WIC program and iron-fortified cereals and infant formulas are given to the program participants are part of the nutritional recommendation for mitigating anemia. Furthermore, the food package has supplements of folate and vitamin B12 which are important in preventing other nutritional related anemias in pregnant mothers, their infants, and children.

Research indicates that the provision of iron supplements through the food offered for those participating in the program can significantly help reduce the prevalence of iron deficiency in women, infant, and children. The significant decline in the dominance of anemia since 1980 has been attributed to participation in the WIC program. On the same note, those who participated in the program and prevent or treat anemia during pregnancy improved pregnancy outcomes. In relation to infants and children, there is a mixed result of cognitive delays and behavior change through the use of supplemental iron. Other studies show impaired cognitive function when formerly anemic children are enrolled in school while others have a strong evidence of complete recovery in relation to iron treatment. Among infants, the use of iron-fortified foods contributes to the prevention of anemia and the delays witnessed among the iron deficient infants who were given non-iron fortified foods.4 At the same time, through random trial, the use of ferrous sulfate in the control of anemia in pregnant mothers resulted to the saturation of iron stores among previously anemic children and was accompanied with full reversal of the development delays. These developmental improvements were rarely observed in the anemic children who were given placebo as a way of mitigating their anemic conditions.

A WIC nutrition assessment conducted by Abt Associates Inc. designed to fill various critical gaps in relation to nutritional education components of the WIC program. The assessment was not meant to be the "best practice" or to provide a nationally accepted picture of the nutritional education applied by WIC program. Rather, this study was exploratory and examined processes and outcomes from six different local WIC agencies serving the different population and used a variety of approaches to provide nutritional education. The research findings were meant to focus on the future research in the area through the application of longitudinal design i.e. repeated measure from the same group of WIC program participant's overtime. Subsequently, the study applied a mixture of approaches to collect data that allowed the collection of comparable data from various sources.5 This provided a range of essential issues forms different perspectives. Out of the six WIC agencies that participated in the study, they acknowledged nutritionally related education, attitudes of the participants and behaviors towards mitigating anemia. This indicates that nutritional education provided at the WIC program sites has a significant influence on the success of preventing and treatment anemia among pregnant women, children, and infants.

References

Swensen A, Harnack L, ROSS J. Nutritional Assessment of Pregnant Women Enrolled in the Special Supplemental Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC). Journal of the American Dietetic Association. 2001;101(8):903-908. doi:10.1016/s0002-8223(01)00221-8.

Hemminki E, Uski A, Koponen P, Rimpela U. Iron supplementation during pregnancyexperiences of a randomized trial relying on health service personnel. Controlled Clinical Trials. 1989;10(3):290-298. doi:10.1016/0197-2456(89)90069-x.

Jacknowitz A, Novillo D, Tiehen L. Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children and Infant Feeding Practices. PEDIATRICS. 2007;119(2):281-289. doi:10.1542/peds.2006-1486.

Abernathy T. Responsibilities of the USDA-Food and Nutrition Service in Nutrition Assistance Response to Natural Disasters. Journal of Nutritional Science and Vitaminology. 2015;61(Supplement):S14-S14. doi:10.3177/jnsv.61.s14.

Prevalence of Anemia Risk Factors in Pregnant Women. International Journal of Science and Research (IJSR). 2016;5(4):2107-2108. doi:10.21275/v5i4.21041602.