A report from the State of Indiana has identified several key factors in the state's problem with infant mortality.
According to the report, Indiana's infant mortality rate in 2011 was 7.7 deaths per 1,000 live births. The state had showed "no significant change" in infant mortality between 2005 and 2011, despite a 12 percent national decline in the rate between that period, according to the report.
According to the study, the strongest predictor of adverse birth outcomes included inadequate prenatal care, Medicaid enrollment and young maternal age.
According to http://www.countyhealthrankings.org, which has data from 2005-2011, Huntington County teens aged 15-19 accounted for 29 out of every 1,000 live births, lower than the state average of 40 out of every 1,000 live births.
According to http://indianaindicators.org, which has data from 2010, 75.8 percent of Huntington County births had mothers who started prenatal care in the first trimester, higher than the state average of 70.3 percent.
Huntington County Coroner Phil Zahm said the county averages around one or two infant deaths a year that he handles.
"A majority of them ends up being SIDS (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome) cases," he said. "If I recall, we had one where there was an actual, physical problem with the child during its growth that actually caused its death. But, everything we normally see will be a SIDS related death."
Zahm said the county also has a Child Mortality Review Team, which meets to discuss the infant deaths in the county. The team discusses the cause of death and what can be done, he said.
"With SIDS death, there's a lot of talk about the position of the baby, whether to lay it on the back or stomach, those are things that we discuss," Zahm said. "Also if there is any ideas that we can do on a local level to get information out to parents."
Important things the group has discussed and try to get out deal with the padding in the crib with the baby and to lay the child on its back, he said.
"A lot of us might see (these things) as common sense, but people who have never been exposed to a child don't know," Zahm said.
The Huntington County Purdue Extension offers a healthy baby class to help educate on the nutritional needs of women who are pregnant, Cynthia McMillan, a nutrition education program assistant for the extension, said.
She said a woman's nutritional need for woman change when she is eating for two.
"Whatever you put into your body affects the baby," McMillan said. "We want to stay away from the smoking and the drugs and the alcohol that will increase the chance of premature birth and unhealthy babies."
Prenatal care is important, she said.
"We try to decrease the risk of having premature babies," McMillan said. "We want to give the baby every chance to be born healthy."