HRSA Awards a $1.9 Million Grant for MercyOne Rural Family Medicine Residency Program
June 9, 2020
The Health Resources & Services Administration (HRSA) of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has awarded a $1.9 million grant to develop a MercyOne Family Medicine Rural Residency Program. The grant, through HRSA’s Residency Training in Primary Care Program, will be used to increase accredited family medicine residency training in rural areas throughout Iowa to address the state’s shortage of such providers. The MercyOne Family Medicine Rural Residency Program will be the first family medicine residency rural track in the state of Iowa.
This is one of up to 20 grants awarded nationally through this HRSA program. The project was developed on existing academic-clinical partnerships, including with MercyOne’s rural network, the largest primary care network in Iowa.
This grant – awarded to the Iowa Medicine Education Collaborative (IMEC), a partnership of MercyOne Des Moines Medical Center and Primary Health Care, Inc. – will be used to expand MercyOne’s Family Medicine Residency program, which has been training residents since 1997. IMEC is the sponsoring institution for MercyOne Des Moines’ Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) accredited residency and fellowship programs. MercyOne Des Moines Foundation submitted the grant application on behalf of the IMEC.
The project is designed to accomplish the following:
- Develop a comprehensive family medicine rural residency track that geographically spans several rural areas throughout the state.
- Increase the number of family medicine residents who receive longitudinal clinical training in rural primary care clinics.
- Increase the knowledge, skills and competencies that family medicine residents will need to effectively practice in rural communities.
- Retain the graduating family medicine residents who participated in a rural track to stay and practice in Iowa.
“The project will succeed thanks to the strong strategies we will implement,” said Dr. Hijinio Carreon, Chief Medical Officer at MercyOne Des Moines Medical Center.
“These include recruiting residents with ties to rural Iowa, providing development and support to rural preceptors, collaborating with community partners in ten rural communities, developing a rural training track program within the family medicine residency, training residents in their inter-professional team-based care in rural settings, providing longitudinal clinical training in rural areas and implementing a number of activities to retain the graduates in rural Iowa.”
“We are grateful to HRSA for this important grant,” said Shannon Cofield, President of MercyOne Des Moines Foundation.
“Now more than ever, grant and philanthropy plays a vital role in providing much-needed care in all of our communities, especially for those who are most vulnerable among us.”
This project will be supported by the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) as part of an award totaling $1,924,939 with 0% financed with nongovernmental sources. The contents of this press release are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent the official views of, nor an endorsement, by HRSA, HHS or the U.S. Government.
