UNMC Chancellor Jeffrey P. Gold, M.D., welcomed the National Advisory Committee on Rural Health and Human Services to campus Monday morning.
The committee is in Omaha for its twice-yearly, three-day meeting, with agenda items that focus on the Affordable Care Act and its impact on rural populations.
“The committee has come to Nebraska to learn about how implementation of the ACA is going in a truly rural state,” said Ronnie Musgrove, committee chair and former governor of the state of Mississippi. “Nebraska has a large rural population, with a large, well-developed rural health infrastructure. It’s still early in implementing the health care reform, but we will visit some rural hospitals, hear directly from physicians and health care workers, people who have gained insurance recently and others.”
During his address to the committee, Dr. Gold highlighted UNMC’s rural health efforts.
“This is a major area of our focus here at UNMC,” he said.
Dr. Gold discussed the RHOP program and the Nebraska Rural Training Track, among other pipeline programs.
“While there are many challenges of rural and urban care, having the right workforce in the right place with the right specialty is a big part of it,” he said. “At the end of the day if you don’t have the workforce, you’re not going to be able to deliver that care, educate the next generation and have strong research.”
The recent trip UNMC leaders took throughout greater Nebraska highlighted several concerns in rural areas, he told the committee.
“There are very broad workforce concerns about where the next generation of physicians, nurses, pharmacists and dentists is going to come from,” he said. “Their current workforce is aging out, and they are concerned about who’s going to be seeing patients across all the health professions.
“Frankly, they look to us — the University of Nebraska Medical Center — as to ‘What are you going to do about that?’ As they should, by the way,” he said.
The committee is hoping to take useful information from the Omaha meeting.
“After our visit here, we’ll write some policy recommendations for the secretary of the department focused on how to improve implementation in rural areas,” Musgrove said. “Our concern is with making sure the ACA works as well as possible in the rural USA.”