The Need 

   The foster care system has over 450,000 infants and children nationwide and is heavily burdened with an influx of medically fragile infants and children who need our help. These children lack consistency in their lives at every level. A foster child may have as many as ten to sixteen different foster homes, depending on how long they are in the system. These children are harder to place with the average foster parent because of their particular needs. They become the forgotten members of our society. Left alone in hospitals and institutions, these precious souls are inevitably identified as "failure to thrive."

   Furthermore, a notable increase in epidemic drug use among pregnant women has resulted in an escalating number of premature foster care infants with marked medical and developmental complications. Concurrently, due to our opioid crisis, there is a growing number of cases where infants and children become medically fragile at the hands of their parents. Due to abuse or neglect, so that returning them to their biological home is not the child's best interest. Each year, thousands of children enter the foster care system needing specialized medical care. They may require medical equipment such as IV infusions, feeding tubes, nebulizers, or oxygen. Others require a medical team that monitors and manages congenital heart defects, gastrointestinal disorders, or autoimmune disorders. AIW's mission is to recruit nurses to provide consistent care to save our most vulnerable infants and children by changing State laws, providing in-home nursing care, and eliminating long-term Foster Care placements. Our Nurse-Resource-Adopt Program offers the ideal start to a happy and healthy childhood.

Nurse Foster Providers Are Needed

Nurses, Do You Want To Clock In At Home?

   The Unfortunate New Faces in Our Foster Care System Are America's Preemies! Life is precious, and all children deserve to have someone to love them, protect them, and care for their needs. However, all too frequently, this is not the case for far too many infants and children, particularly those languishing in our courts and foster care systems.

Compounded by these issues are medically fragile foster care infants and children who face particular challenges early in life. These obstacles may be prematurity, a heart condition, medical complications due to drug exposure, or other congenital defects. Even if they survive their medical traumas, without the nurturing and loving touch of a parent who cares, they are doomed to become just another tragic statistic in our failing foster care system. 

    AIW helped create a California State Law in 2014. Chapter #490 California Law requires, when determining the placement of a medically fragile foster child, "Priority Consideration" will be given to a placement with a foster/resource parent who is a nurse provider under the EPSDT private duty nursing programs. AIW created this law for our growing medically fragile foster care population, including micro-preemies, infants, children, and youths who languish in institutions, group homes, or less-educated and poorly supported resource / foster homes. If these precious souls do not go into the hands of dedicated nurses first, they are usually passed back and forth into numerous foster care placements, a life no child should endure. Our Independent Nurse Provider Program has an 85% adoption rate and a consistent need for dedicated nurses.