Primary Care Payday

HRSA awards ATSU-SOMA $1.9 million for primary care fellowship

The grant will support a fellowship for physicians and physician assistants in underserved communities.

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The A.T. Still University School of Osteopathic Medicine in Arizona (ATSU-SOMA) just got a boost.

A big one.

Over the next five years, ATSU-SOMA will receive $1.9 million from the Department of Health and Human Services’ Health Resources and Services Administration. The grant will support a primary care fellowship for physicians and physician assistants that’s designed to bolster the health care workforce in underserved communities.

Dubbed the primary care transformation executive fellowship, the one-year fellowship is open to primary care physicians and physician assistants with at least two years of practice experience in a community-based setting. ATSU-SOMA plans to award at least 20 fellowships over the five-year period, prioritizing clinicians working in community health centers.

‘Primary care champions’

“The grant will advance the training of practicing primary care physicians and physician assistants in the areas of leadership, team-based integrated health care, quality improvement, population health, social determinants of health, health policy, and health education—all components of health systems, and all elements of health care delivery, we want our students to understand and practice,” Jeffrey Morgan, DO, dean of ATSU-SOMA, said in a statement. 

Joy H. Lewis, DO, PhD, professor and chair of the public health department at ATSU-SOMA, agrees.

“This HRSA-funded initiative will join health systems science with community-based research experiences to better position primary care champions to address the social determinants of health,” Dr. Lewis said in a statement.

Acknowledgement and disclaimer: This project is supported by the Health Resources and Services Administration of the Department of Health and Human Services as part of an award totaling $1,999,650. The contents of this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the official views of, nor an endorsement by, HRSA, HHS, or the U.S. government.

Further reading:

9 DO schools rank in top 10 for producing the most primary care residents

DO Match day produces nearly 1,000 primary care residents

Should you do a fellowship? 5 questions to ask yourself

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