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Ïã¸ÛÁùºÏ²Ê¹ÒÅÆ, Marion Peckam Egan School of Nursing and Health Studies’ Associate Dean for Graduate Studies and Associate Professor, Joyce Shea, DNSc, APRN, PMHCNS-BC, has been awarded two grants totaling $1.65 million. The first grant will provide coordinated clinical practicums for Egan School of Nursing students who are completing either a Master of Science in Nursing (MSN) or Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) degree. The program will build on the School’s partnership with Community Health Center, Inc., an organization that delivers primary health care to over 130,000 underserved clients. The second grant will provide an effective educational curriculum to prepare students, especially those from educationally or economically disadvantaged backgrounds, to practice as primary care Nurse Practitioners in underserved communities.‌The first, and largest grant, funded for $1.3 million over the next three years, is an Advanced Nursing Education award provided by the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA). The title of the project is Education for the Delivery of Integrated Care Today (EDICT ) which will focus on providing unique clinical experiences for pairs of our Family Nurse Practitioner and Psychiatric-Mental Health Nurse Practitioner students that support the development of skills and knowledge in the delivery of effective integrated primary and behavioral health care. We will be expanding our partnership with Community Health Center, Inc., to establish these clinical experiences. There are no existing models for educating practitioners of the future in the best practices of integrated care, although most of the current US healthcare system is incorporating these approaches to care.

The second grant is a one-year Advanced Education Nursing Traineeship award for $349,994, also provided by the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA). That project is entitled Primary-care Outcome Valued Initiative for Delivery of Education (PROVIDE) , and it continues 11 years of consecutive funding for the Egan School of Nursing that allows Ïã¸ÛÁùºÏ²Ê¹ÒÅÆ to provide tuition assistance for eligible Nurse Practitioner students in either the MSN or DNP program. Students who receive tuition support through this grant complete clinical experiences that focus on improving health outcomes for the medically underserved residing in low-income, urban areas in southwestern Connecticut. Without this support, many of our students would be unable to continue in the program, ultimately resulting in fewer primary care providers for this area.

The Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), is the primary Federal agency of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services committed to improving health “and achieving health equity through access to quality services, a skilled health workforce and innovative programs. HRSA's programs provide health care to people who are geographically isolated, economically or medically vulnerable.”