The reality for many patients in New Mexico is that they are rural and underserved.
Rural life in one of our state’s many diverse communities offers citizens culturally rich lives steeped in personal interchange and connectedness, but when it comes to health care, these citizens need providers educated and prepared to address specific challenges they face.
The University of New Mexico College of Nursing’s Christine Cogil, DNP, M P S, RN, FNP-BC, associate professor, has been awarded the U.S. Health Resources & Services Administration for Advanced Nursing Education Workforce (ANEW), a multifunctional grant that will help educate the future of nurses prepared to treat the rural and underserved.
Earlier this month it was announced that the Health Resources and Services Administration would be awarding $100 million through fellowships and programs (like ANEW) to educate developing nurses and proactively address the national nursing shortage. More than $34 million was dedicated to those awarded the ANEW grant, the College of Nursing being the only entity in New Mexico to receive funding from this initiative, at $2.6 million. The grant will primarily fund primary care nurse provider student experiences in rural clinical settings.
“Getting students out in the field of rural health care is a sure-fire way to show them the needs of those patients. After their insightful rotations there, our hope is that they return as educated nurses to treat those populations in their career,” Cogil said.
Until a nursing student has sat with a patient faced with cultural and community-based barriers, they will never truly be able to see things from the patient’s perspective. To respect their situation.
This is the significance of rural clinical experiences.
Seventy percent of the monies will be awarded to primary care nurse practitioner students including, mental health and midwifery students to fund their influential clinical rotations, while the remaining funds will be dedicated to building relationships with current and prospective clinical sights and diversification efforts for the College’s student body and faculty.
How do you diversify a faculty? You diversify the student body. Students who experience enriching and impactful curriculum and academic support bring their knowledge and career back to the institution that provided them with a key nursing foundation; to continue the legacy of nursing education in New Mexico.
Cogil concludes, “Rural life is beautiful, and New Mexico is filled with unique communities of people. People who deserve nurses prepared to serve them. This ANEW grant is going to help us do that. We are going to fund student education and clinical experiences and build those clinical partnerships, all for the privilege of serving our citizens of rural New Mexico.”