Future of Nursing: Campaign for Action Announces State-Level Collaborations

In October, the Future of Nursing: Campaign for Action, coordinated through the Center to Champion Nursing in America, an initiative of AARP, the AARP Foundation, and RWJF, highlighted a year of progress since the Institute of Medicine (IOM) released its landmark report, The Future of Nursing: Leading Change, Advancing Health. The report outlined a blueprint for ensuring all Americans get high-quality, cost-effective care when and where they need it. In just one year, the report has become one of the most viewed online reports in the history of the IOM has generated more than 64 million media impressions. As the first year since the release approached, the campaign announced the selection of 21 new state-based collaborations, called Action Coalitions, to help advance the report’s recommendations; they join 15 Action Coalitions already in place. To stay up-to-date on new developments, visit the Campaign for Action website.

Read More Programs’ Progress »

• Clinical Scholars Program to Publish a Special Issue on Translating Research to Policy in Health Services Research
• Community Health Leaders Prepares to Announce 2011 Leaders
• Executive Nurse Fellows Program Welcomes New Cohort
• Harold Amos Medical Faculty Development Program Holds 27th Annual Meeting
• Health & Society Scholars Co-Director Elected President of Population Association of America
• Health Policy Fellows Program Is Accepting Applications
• Nurse Faculty Scholars Program Announces New Cohort

Clinical Scholars Program to Publish a Special Issue on Translating Research to Policy in Health Services Research
Health Services Research and the Clinical Scholars program will publish a special issue of the journal titled “Bridging the Gap Between Research and Health Policy—Insights From the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Clinical Scholars Program.” Current and former Clinical Scholars were invited to submit manuscripts as top-quality examples of policy-relevant research. Authors were asked to include a section in their manuscripts describing how their research has informed or is expected to inform policy-makers. The articles will be published online in advance of the print publication in February 2012. The first article, “Nonfinancial Barriers and Access to Care for U.S. Adults,” by Jeff Kullgren, MD, MPH, (’09) was published online in August. The following articles were published online on October 17, 2011:

• In “Physician Social Networks and Variation in Prostate Cancer Treatment,” alumnus Craig Pollack, MD, MHS, (’06) uses insurance claims data to examine whether physician social networks are associated with variation in treatment for men with localized prostate cancer. He found that subgroups varied widely in their treatment of prostate cancer and in the socioeconomic composition of their patients. Pollack and his colleagues suggest that using claims data to identify physician networks may provide insight into quality of care and identify clusters of high- and low-quality care networks to identify best practices models and opportunities for improvement.
• In “Adoption of Medical Home Infrastructure Among Physician Practices: Policy, Pitfalls, and Possibilities,” alumnus John Hollingsworth, MD, MS, (’08) identifies the proportion of physician practices in the United States that currently meet medical home criteria. After mapping survey items to the National Committee on Quality Assurance’s (NCQA’s) medical home standards, he found that 46 percent of all practices lack sufficient medical home infrastructure. While 72.3 percent of multi-specialty groups would achieve recognition, only 49.8 percent of solo/partnership practices meet NCQA standards. Although better prepared than specialists, 40 percent of primary care practices would not qualify as a medical home under present criteria. Overall, almost half of all practices fail to meet NCQA standards for medical home recognition.
• In “Expanding the Safety-Net of Specialty Care for the Uninsured: A Case Study,” Clinical Scholars alumna Erica Spatz, MD, (’08) and colleagues demonstrate how Project Access–New Haven—a community-based partnership among academic researchers, safety-net providers, specialty physicians, hospitals, and advocates for the underserved—established a way to expand access to specialty care for the uninsured and to coordinate care through patient navigation. Spatz shows how implementation relied on the application of core principles from community-based participatory research. Involving safety-net providers, specialty physicians, hospitals, and community stakeholders in all steps of development allowed them to respond to potential barriers and to implement a navigated care model for the uninsured. This process may be relevant for future capacity-building efforts to accommodate the specialty care needs of other vulnerable populations, including the underinsured and those covered by Medicaid.
• In “Does a Video-Interpreting Network Improve Delivery of Care?,” alumna Liz Jacobs, MD, MPP, (’96) and colleagues measure the impact of a policy change from use of telephonic and face-to-face interpreting to use of a video-interpreting network on emergency department (ED) care. They found that use of a video-interpreting network in the ED did not improve care for patients who do not speak English well.

Community Health Leaders Prepares to Announce 2011 Leaders
The Community Health Leaders is gearing up for its annual meeting, which will be held November 9–10 in Baltimore. At a ceremony during the meeting on November 9, the Foundation also will announce the 2011 Community Health Leaders. RWJF Chief Executive Officer and President Risa Lavizzo-Mourey, MD, PhD, MBA, will present the incoming leaders with their awards.

The nominations for the 2012 Community Health Leaders award are currently being accepted. The Community Health Leaders award includes national recognition, opportunities to network and collaborate with fellow health leaders around the country, and $125,000 to support the leader’s work. The winners receive tools and knowledge to help them continue their efforts to improve health and health care where they live. For additional information on submitting a nomination, visit www.communityhealthleaders.org.

Executive Nurse Fellows Program Welcomes New Cohort
The Executive Nurse Fellows program welcomed 21 fellows as part of its 2011 cohort in August. They join more than 200 nurse leaders who have participated in the RWJF Executive Nurse Fellows program since it began in 1998. This world-class fellowship program enhances nurse leaders’ effectiveness in helping to lead a reformed health care system.

Harold Amos Medical Faculty Development Program Holds 27th Annual Meeting
The Harold Amos Medical Faculty Development Program held its 27th annual meeting in New Orleans on October 4–6. Alumnus Robert Satcher, MD, PhD, (’03) delivered the Edward Hook Memo Lecture.

Health & Society Scholars Co-Director Elected President of Population Association of America
Christine A. Bachrach, PhD, co-director of the Health & Society Scholars program, was recently elected president of the Population Association of America (PAA). She will serve as president of the association in 2013 but will begin her work in 2012 as president-elect, working with other officers and the PAA board to provide governance to the association and its activities, and to plan the 2013 annual scientific meeting in New Orleans. Bachrach also will serve on the PAA board in 2014 for the conclusion of her three-year term as past president.

“Serving as president of the PAA is a great honor and privilege,” Bachrach said. “The tremendous growth of interest within demography in issues of population health makes this a particularly exciting opportunity for me. I am hoping to be able to strengthen the connections between demography and other disciplines contributing to population health research during my tenure as PAA president.”

The PAA is a scientific professional association that promotes research on population issues. With about 3,000 members drawn from universities, government, and the private sector, the association fosters knowledge of population processes such as fertility, mortality, health, migration, and family formation and dissolution through the publication of the journal Demography, scientific meetings, and public education.

“We are very proud of Dr. Bachrach’s election to the presidency of PAA,” said Health & Society Scholars Co-Director Jo Ivey Boufford, MD. “It is an honor for her and a feather in the cap of the Health & Society Scholars program to have the co-director and longtime member of our National Advisory Committee recognized in this way. She has made enormous contributions to research in population health throughout her career and will continue to do so in her leadership role at PAA.”

Bachrach was named co-director of the Health & Society Scholars national program office last April.

Health Policy Fellows Program Accepting Applications
The Health Policy Fellows program provides the nation’s most comprehensive fellowship experience at the nexus of health science, policy, and politics in Washington, D.C. It is an outstanding opportunity for exceptional midcareer health professionals and behavioral and social scientists with an interest in health and health care policy. Fellows participate in the policy process at the federal level and use that leadership experience to improve health, health care, and health policy. See the current Call for Applications and apply online. Application deadline is November 9, 2011, at 3 p.m. eastern time.

Nurse Faculty Scholars Program Announces New Cohort
The Nurse Faculty Scholars program announced its new cohort of 12 scholars. The award is given to junior faculty who show outstanding promise as future leaders in academic nursing. The Nurse Faculty Scholars program aims to strengthen the academic productivity and overall excellence of nursing schools by developing the next generation of national leaders in academic nursing. This is the fourth cohort of Nurse Faculty Scholars. Many members of the first three cohorts have been published and recognized for outstanding work since they were accepted into the program.