From the Start Maternal Health Initiative

From the Start is a 2026 AHCA maternal-health initiative aligning Statewide Medicaid Managed Care plans around enhanced pregnancy and postpartum supports. It covers five areas: closing care gaps, holistic support, early risk identification, paying for quality, and supporting postpartum recovery. [FL-FTS1, FL-FTS2]

It creates a statewide floor of maternal supports while care is still delivered through individual plans and their provider networks.

It applies to Florida Medicaid mothers in managed care. Some supports are broadly available; others are triggered by clinical risk, dietary need or care-management criteria. Your plan determines the workflow.

Aligned supports include unlimited doula support, mobile OB/GYN services, removing transportation barriers, telehealth, pregnancy-redetermination assistance, remote patient monitoring and nurse management for high-risk pregnancies, enhanced home visiting, home-delivered meals for certain dietary needs, breast pumps, lactation classes, postpartum-depression screening through pediatric settings, and scheduling the postpartum visit before discharge. [FL-FTS1, FL-FTS2]

The initiative spans the prenatal and postpartum periods, but each benefit has its own window and clinical rules. Medicaid eligibility itself can continue 12 months postpartum.

Enhanced supports come at no additional cost through your Medicaid health plan. [FL-FTS1]

Tell your plan early that you are pregnant and ask specifically for From the Start. Ask what is automatic versus assessment- or care-management-based, and how to obtain doula, transportation and postpartum supports.

Your Medicaid ID, plan name, due date or end-of-pregnancy date, and providers. Risk-based benefits may require a clinical or care-management assessment.

The initiative does not make every service automatically available to every member. Some benefits are risk- or need-based, provider capacity varies, and plan pages and handbooks may lag the statewide alignment. It does not change DCF eligibility. [FL-FTS1, FL-FTS3]

From the Start operates inside Medicaid managed care. Healthy Start and CONNECT are separate public-health systems you can use at the same time. FMLA and employer leave are separate.

Use plan Member Services and the plan provider directory, and Choice Counseling at 1-877-711-3662. If frontline staff do not recognize the benefit, ask for maternity care management or a supervisor and reference the initiative.

Plans provide language assistance. Ask about interpreters and, separately, about provider-level language and cultural fit.

If you are not Medicaid eligible, Healthy Start is the strongest statewide free support, and CONNECT is the route into home visiting.