The MIHOW Model

Materials

Standards for sponsoring agencies and outreach workers protect the integrity, quality, and consistency of the program by ensuring that all MIHOW sites adhere to the same basic principles. Performance standards for outreach workers also serve as a guide for the workers' professional development.

The MIHOW Home Visit Guides (The Prenatal Period, The First Year of Life, The Second Year of Life, and The Third Year of Life)
Month-by-month guides including strategies to improve mother and child's self-image, sharpen problem-solving skills and promote planning, goal setting, and self-advocacy. 

The Administrators' Manual: How to Build a MIHOW Program in Your Community
 Topics include training and supervision, case management, safety and security issues for outreach workers, program planning, and sustainability.

MIHOW Matters
Published electronically, this newsletter highlights MIHOW workers, sites, and specific projects. It is distributed to program donors.  For the latest updates, sign up for the MIHOW Matters newsletter.

The MIHOW Monthly
An informal two-page newsletter providing a forum for the exchange of ideas and information on upcoming events and deadlines, national health observances, websites of interest, outreach worker profiles, health quizzes, and family-related humor.

REACH - The Five Step Recipe for a Home Visit
A tool (pocket size laminated card) developed to provide a quick reminder of the essential ingredients for an effective home visit. Each worker has a version for quick reference.

The MIHOW Way
The program's training manual for outreach workers.  This manual lays out all of the requirements and strategies for effective initial training of outreach workers so that they begin home visiting with a firm understanding of the basics of family health and communication.  The manual also provides the tools needed by sites to provide high quality training throughout the worker's first year of employment.

The MIHOW Safety Guide
introduces new outreach workers to the precautions and safeguards which must be in place while conducting home visits.  The guide identifies the safety issues that outreach workers may face while in community homes, such as mental illness, domestic violence, substance abuse, etc. and provides the relevant tools and steps which must be taken to assure the safety of the outreach worker and others in the home.