[NYAPRS Enews] HHS Awards $130 Million to Boost Health Professions Workforce

[Harvey Rosenthal]

HHS Awards $130 Million to Boost Health Professions Workforce

Grants Focus on Health Workforce Training, Diversity and Disparities

September 17, 2010

 

HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius today announced $130.8 million in grants
to strengthen and expand the health professions workforce. Six areas are
targeted: primary care workforce training, oral health workforce
training, equipment to enhance training across the health professions,
loan repayments for health professionals, health careers opportunity
programs for disadvantaged students, and Patient Navigator outreach and
chronic disease prevention in health disparity populations. The grants
include $88.7 million in funding from the American Recovery and
Reinvestment Act.

"An adequate health care workforce is the linchpin for reforming our
health care system to ensure greater access, improve the quality of
health care and cut overall costs in the long term," said Secretary
Sebelius. "Today's awards not only will provide more training
opportunities for people interested in a health professions career, but
also will support equipment purchases and faculty development to expand
and enhance the quality of training."

"With an aging and increasingly diverse population, we need to prepare
our health professionals to meet the challenges of providing health care
in the twenty-first century," noted Mary K. Wakefield, Ph.D., R.N.,
administrator of HHS' Health Resources and Services Administration
(HRSA), which oversees the programs. "This includes ensuring diversity
in the workforce, and that well-trained professionals practice in areas
of severe need."

 

Expanding the Primary Care Workforce

Training Programs in Primary Care - $42.1 million ($31.5 million
Recovery Act)

Grants will support family medicine, general internal medicine, and
general pediatrics programs, including curriculum development, faculty
development, didactic and community-based education, and training in
underserved areas for primary care residents, pre-doctoral students,
interdisciplinary and inter-professional graduate students, and
physician assistant students.

Oral Health - $23.9 million ($6.7 million Recovery Act)

Funding will target workforce development programs for pre- and
post-doctoral training for dental residents; dental faculty; loan
repayment for faculty who teach primary care dentistry; and training for
practicing dentists, or other approved dental trainees in general,
pediatric, and public health dentistry and dental hygiene programs.
Funding also includes $4.3 million to States to provide 9 new grantees
the opportunity to address their states' unique oral health workforce
needs in underserved urban and rural areas. Grants are designed to
strengthen the delivery of multidisciplinary comprehensive oral health
care, integral to quality primary care.

 

Equipment for State-of-the-Art Learning

Equipment to Enhance Training for Health Professionals - $50.5 million
(Recovery Act)

Funding from the Recovery Act will provide 208 awards to assist with
purchasing equipment for training current and future health
professionals across disciplines at the undergraduate, graduate, and
post- graduate education levels. Awardees include academic health
centers, Area Health Education Centers, Centers of Excellence, and other
educational institutions that serve underserved and uninsured patient
populations, rural communities, and minorities. Equipment purchases will
expand current training capabilities by replacing outdated equipment and
technology or purchasing equipment that previously was unaffordable.

Types of equipment to be purchased include e-learning tools such as
video, audio and interactive learning systems that provide more distance
learning opportunities; human patient simulators that give students the
opportunity to improve clinical judgment and critical thinking; and
mobile dental vans that provide training in delivering care to diverse
segments of the population while bringing basic routine dental
treatments to families unable to access care. It is estimated that more
than 200,000 individuals will be trained, including health professions
students, faculty and clinical practice providers.

 

Priming the Workforce Pipeline

Loan Repayment ($8.3 million) - Twenty-nine (29) grants will be made to
States that provide matching funds to assist health professionals in
repaying their educational loans. In return, these individuals agree to
provide full-time primary health services in Federal Health Professional
Shortage Areas for a minimum of two years. Health professionals eligible
to receive funding include physicians, dentists, nurse practitioners,
nurse midwives, physician assistants, psychologists, and social workers.

Health Careers Opportunity Program ($2.1 million) - Three (3) grantees
will receive funding to increase diversity in the health professions by
developing an educational pipeline to enhance the academic performance
of economically and educationally disadvantaged students, and prepare
them for careers in the health professions. Eligible applicants included
schools of medicine, public health, dentistry, pharmacy, allied health,
and graduate programs in behavioral or mental health.

Patient Navigator ($3.8 million) - Funding will support 10 grants for
Patient Navigator Outreach and Chronic Disease Prevention Programs to
develop and operate patient navigator services that improve health care
outcomes for individuals with cancer or other chronic diseases, with
specific emphasis on health disparity populations. Grant recipients
recruit, train, and employ patient navigators with direct knowledge of
the communities they serve to coordinate care for patients with chronic
illnesses. Eligible applicants include federally qualified health
centers, health facilities operated through Indian Health Service
contracts, hospitals, rural health clinics, and academic health centers.

Grant award tables by state are available at
http://www.hhs.gov/news/press/2010pres/09/state_charts.html.

For more information on HRSA's health professions programs, go to
http://bhpr.hrsa.gov/

The Health Resources and Services Administration is part of the U. S.
Department of Health and Human Services. HRSA is the primary federal
agency responsible for improving access to health care services for
people who are uninsured, isolated, or medically vulnerable. For more
information about HRSA and its programs, visit www.hrsa.gov
<http://www.hrsa.gov/> 

 

 

 

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