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Strengthen the Evidence for Maternal and Child Health Programs

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Hiscock Historical Collection

Preserving the Early Development of Medicaid's EPSDT Benefit

About EPSDT

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) requires states to ensure that all Medicaid-eligible children and youth under age 21 receive comprehensive health services, especially early and periodic screening, diagnostic, and treatment (EPSDT) services.

The EPSDT program was enacted by Congress in 1967 and became effective in 1969. EPSDT is designed to address problems early, ameliorate conditions, and intervene as early as possible and is key to ensuring that children and adolescents receive appropriate preventive, dental, mental health, and developmental, and specialty services.

EPSDT Services Include:

Early and comprehensive health care to assess a child's health status, identify risks or concerns, and intervene promptly.
Periodic well-child visits at recommended age-appropriate intervals (periodicity).
Screening services including health history, physical exam, tests and assessments, immunizations, and health guidance.
Diagnostic services to determine the nature and cause of identified health problems and evaluate treatment options.
Treatment services, including early intervention, to correct or improve physical, developmental, and mental health conditions.

Additional Information:

For current resources on EPSDT, see EPSDT Services in Medicaid knowledge path. An infographic of EPSDT is provided by CMS.

About the Hiscock Collection

The William McConway Hiscock collection and index was donated to NCEMCH in 1995. In 2015, NCEMCH received a grant from the National Network of Libraries of Medicine to digitize materials in the collection, make them available through this web page, and incorporate the electronic holdings into the MCH Knowledge Base, which houses critical resources of the last century in maternal and child health.*

The original collection included 157 documents focused on the early development of the program. This collection includes all documents that are available, and is supplemented with other materials from the NCEMCH MCH Knowledge Base from 1972 through the early 2000's for a total of 175 titles.

William McConway Hiscock, whose 47-year career in public health ranged from directing studies in public health training for the Yale University School of Medicine, to being executive director of the Central Maryland Health Systems Agency, Inc, to serving as a program officer for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' Health Care Financing Administration (now CMS). During the 1960's, while at the Office of the Surgeon General, Hiscock was involved in drafting legislation that eventually created the Medicaid system, EPSDT, and other Federal health programs to aid children, senior citizens, and vulnerable populations.

Search the Collection

View Documents by Topic Area

Use the following links to find all documents in the collection that address critical issues addressed by EPSDT:

* This project has been funded in whole or in part with Federal funds from the National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health, Department of Health and Human Services, under Contract No. HHS-N-276-2011-00004-C with the University of Maryland Baltimore.

The MCH Digital Library is one of six special collections at Geogetown University, the nation's oldest Jesuit institution of higher education. It is supported in part by the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) under award number U02MC31613, MCH Advanced Education Policy with an award of $700,000/year. The library is also supported through foundation and univerity funding. This information or content and conclusions are those of the author and should not be construed as the official position or policy of, nor should any endorsements be inferred by HRSA, HHS or the U.S. Government.