URI awarded $2.5M grant to create program to improve geriatric care

THE UNIVERSITY of Rhode Island has been awarded a $2.5 million grant to implement a health care workforce program that will lead to higher quality care for older patients.
THE UNIVERSITY of Rhode Island has been awarded a $2.5 million grant to implement a health care workforce program that will lead to higher quality care for older patients.

SOUTH KINGSTOWN – The University of Rhode Island has been awarded a $2.5 million grant to implement a health care workforce program that will lead to higher quality care for older patients, according to a news release.
An initiative of the U.S. Health Resources and Services Administration, the Geriatrics Workforce Enhancement Program is a $35 million program with the aim of preparing health care professionals for issues associated with advancing age. The program will educate and train health care providers, students and patients about the delivery of health care that older adults often need, according to information from the university.
URI is one of 44 universities and organizations to receive the grant and is among 14 – including Johns Hopkins University, the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill and the University of California-Los Angeles – that received the maximum allocation of $2.5 million over three years.
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia M. Burwell announced the awards July 13. She said the grants “reaffirm our commitment to invest in a workforce that will ensure high quality care for older adults.”
“The geriatrics programs supported by these grants help schools design curricula that respond to the needs of aging adults and lead to better care. These investments will promote access to quality health care for older adults by supporting their self-management, their families’ engagement in their care, and the dedicated caregivers who work with them,” Burwell said.

Features of the Rhode Island Geriatrics Workforce Enhancement Program include:

  • Develop providers who can assess and address the needs of older adults and their families by integrating inter-professional geriatrics education into primary care delivery systems to provide coordinated, comprehensive, patient/family-centered health care.
  • Develop and offer community-based education programs for patients, families and caregivers to improve the management of multiple chronic conditions.
  • Provide Alzheimer’s disease and related disorders education to health professions students, providers, patients, families and caregivers.

The need for investment in this type of training for R.I. is in the numbers, URI said, adding the state has the highest percentage of residents ages 85 and older in the nation. Geriatric patients and their physicians are often unaware of how the effects of aging can alter the type of care delivered to this population, according to Philip Clark, director of URI’s Gerontology Program, professor of human development and family studies and director of the Rhode Island Geriatric Workforce Enhancement Program.

“The reality is, treatment for geriatric patients can be considerably different from that of other adults,” Clark said. “These differences can be subtle and, without the very specific training we can provide through this program, some primary care providers may not even be aware of them.”

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“The idea is to foster a team environment, with providers – including physicians, nurses, pharmacists, social workers and other health professionals – learning to work with each other, with students and with their patients to deliver quality health care,” Clark said. “Older people are affected by chronic medical issues and have a variety of unique psychosocial needs. For example, their bodies react differently to medications than a younger adult might. Diseases can present very differently in older patients and primary care providers may not recognize the symptoms.”

URI teamed with a host of partners – including Care New England, Brown University, Rhode Island College, the Rhode Island chapter of the Alzheimer’s Association and Healthcentric Advisors, and networks of primary care providers – to identify the specific geriatrics education and training needs of the state’s health care workforce.

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