Nurse-Family Partnership

The Nurse-Family Partnership (NFP) is an evidence-based nurse home visiting program for low-income, high-risk first-time mothers from early pregnancy through their infant's second birthday. New York City piloted this national program in Queens in 2003 and is now scaling the program up to reach over 2,600 families by June 2008. Grant funding through the Fund for Public Health in New York (FPHNY) supported the initial expansion of the program to Brooklyn and currently provides support for key strategic program enhancements.

The NFP model has been proven to reduce rates of child abuse, arrests, smoking and alcohol consumption for mothers and their children, and increase positive outcomes such as time between births, healthier pregnancies, and mothers transitioning off of welfare. The success of the NFP model in giving new families a better start led Mayor Michael Bloomberg to identify the program as a key feature of the City's agenda to combat poverty.

NFP offers intensive care and social support for first-time mothers through home visits by trained nurses until the child is 2 years old. The NFP model has been shown to have the potential to break harmful family patterns by laying a foundation for health, economic stability, and greater opportunity at a critical moment in the lives of women.