OVAR/GEC Interdisciplinary Care

  • Johnson, Helen (PI)

Grants and Contracts Details

Description

The OV AR consortium was created in 1985 as a result of a desire to improve the health care for older persons by enhancing the training of health care faculty, students and providers. The region has in common a large underserved area with a large and increasing population of elders at risk for poor health outcomes. Each university brings special strengths to the consortium arrangement, and by joining together, the four universities are able to minimize costs while maximizing access to geriatrics faculty and educational resources. OV AR serves 167 medically underserved counties in the entire state of KY, southern OH, eastern TN, southern IN and southwestern VA. The administrative base is at the University of KY and faculty infrastructures are established at all four institutions. Over 500 aging services Community linkages are in place across the region to assure OV AR success. The 2004-07 OV AR needs assessments identified gaps in training and resources in the area of transitions in care for elders. Frail older persons may receive care in multiple settings from multiple health care providers and caregivers. Care may be transferred numerous times among family and/or home health providers, general practitioners and specialists, emergency rooms, intensive care units, acute hospitals, rehabilitation centers, nursing homes, and hospice. Within each of these settings the responsibility for care may transfer to numerous departments and interdisciplinary professionals without benefit of information, medical records, and preferences/instructions for care. The problems inherent in interdisciplinary transferences of aging care are multiplied in the OV AR region because rural Appalachian elderly are more likely to be poor and less educated, operate in physical and social isolation, lack transportation networks, and have limited access to health care delivery systems. The OVAR needs assessments also identified five new audiences requesting OV AR training: University of Southern IN, Pikeville College School of Osteopathic Medicine, Western KY University, the Stoeckinger Foundation's Parish Nurses, and KY State University, a historically African American/Black University. In response to these special audiences and needs assessments, this project will include 6 Interactive TV blended technology case conferences, 12 regional geriatrics conferences, 3 Train the Trainer workshops on Alzheimer's disease, 9 aging competencies workshops on care transitions, 6 national workshops on geriatric emergency preparedness and response, 30 geriatrics grand rounds, and standardized patients trainings for students. OV AR will create a new interdisciplinary Internet data base, curriculum and 3 standard patients' scripts on health literacy in geriatrics. Training/resources will be targeted to health provider/patient needs, and health status outcomes resulting from the use of assessment tools disseminated in training will be reported following the AD train the trainer, aging competencies workshops, and faculty training initiatives. A total of 17,016 hrs. for 4,389 trainees will result. All project activities will be interdisciplinary and include Medicine and at least three other disciplines. This project meets the five GEC statutory purposes; incorporate Healthy People 2010 and Geriatric Education White Papers recommendations; target national and OV AR geriatric training needs in the underserved geographic area ofKY, southern OH, eastern TN, southwest VA, and southern IN; addresses health disparities and workforce shortages; targets patient-centered clinical practices and provides mechanisms for documenting patient health status outcomes; and requests an administrative funding priority that will provide a total of 54 faculty with 1296 hours of training/retraining in health literacy in geriatrics. missions, 69 SNF admissions,
StatusFinished
Effective start/end date9/1/076/30/09

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