View PDF - North Dakota Medicine

Cultivating Rural
The School’s programs nurture rural health care professionals.
In isolated rural North Dakota, the patient to physician ratio is 1482:1
In urban areas it is 308:1
Source: Center for Rural Health
Take a moment to consider what a health
workforce pipeline means to you. It may
hold any number of meanings. There are
three entities in North Dakota hard at work
to create a new meaning for workforce
pipeline, one that offers encouragement
and sustenance for current and potential
rural health care employees.
The Center for Rural Health (CRH),
North Dakota Area Health Education
Center (AHEC), and the University of
North Dakota School of Medicine and
Health Sciences (UND SMHS) believe
students at young ages need to be introduced
and encouraged to pursue careers in health
care. During elementary, middle school,
secondary, and postsecondary education,
budding professionals need insight into
rural experiences. Rural health care
professionals require environments that
foster their work, continued professional
growth, and appreciation of the
communities they serve through the
meaningful work they do. Collaborative
efforts between the AHEC, CRH, and
SMHS feed the needs of North Dakota’s
future and current health workforce.
Workforce development efforts are divided
this way: K–16 students are introduced to
health care careers, professionals are
introduced to rural settings, and rural
providers are supported in their efforts of
providing care.
K–12
There are over 100,000 students in North
Dakota’s elementary, middle, and secondary
schools; there are nearly 50,000 students at
North Dakota’s colleges and universities.
This makes for a very large pool of
potential rural health care providers, and
the net has been cast. Every year, many
18 NORTH DAKOTA MEDICINE Holiday 2012