Funding Opportunities

Strategies to Advance Recruitment, Retention and Training (STARRT)
MFH offers this Request for Concept Papers to identify projects to implement new or enhanced training, retention and recruitment programs for health professionals in Missouri.

Opens: Jan. 11, 2012 | View RCP
Pre-Concept Paper Conference: Jan. 18, 2012
Closes: Feb. 7, 2012 at 4pm
Selected Applicants Notified: Feb. 24, 2012

2012 Scholarship Program Administrator
MFH offers this Request for Proposals (RFP) to contract with a qualified consultant to develop and implement a scholarship management program targeting undergraduate students pursuing degrees in health care and/or public health.

Opens: Jan. 17, 2012 | View RFP
Closes: Feb. 3, 2012
Anticipated Award: March 2012

Closed RFAs can be found on the Archive page.

Links and Resources

Recent Report:

Committee on The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Initiative on the Future Of Nursing, at the Institute of Medicine- The Future of Nursing: Leading Change, Advancing Health

Human Resource Service Administration (HRSA)
Missouri Hospital Association
National Rural Health Association
View the MFH Resource Directory

For More Information

For more information on the MFH Health Care Workforce funding program, contact:

Deidre Griffith
Program Officer
314.345.5538
dgriffith@mffh.org

Health Care Workforce Development

The United States is in the midst of a shortage of healthcare professionals. Many states, including Missouri, are reporting vacancies in a number of health care positions including primary care practitioners, nursing, pharmacists, laboratory personnel, and physical/occupational therapists.

More than 80 percent of the state has been designated a health professional shortage area, leaving one in five Missourians currently without access to primary care services.

Following significant research into this issue and an MFH-sponsored gathering of various stakeholders in 2009, MFH has established a new funding program to support efforts to build a strong, accessible and sustainable health care workforce in Missouri.

In 2012, grantmaking will target a variety of health professionals experiencing shortages by focusing on three areas:

Recruitment
Retention
Training

Goal

The goal of the Health Care Workforce Development funding program is to reduce the current and predicted shortages of health care workers and professionals. Programs funded under this initiative support the recruitment of youth into health careers, the education and training of medical students and the recruitment of medical workers and professionals into college and medical school faculty positions.

History
Health care workforce development was the topic of the 2009 MFH Summit. Thirty-six experts from eight states presented 22 sessions on the health care workforce shortage. Sessions focused on defining the problem in Missouri, establishing causes for the shortage and identifying promising solutions to the problem.Common themes included the importance of exposing and attracting youth to health careers, increasing access to physician assistants and nurse practitioners, increasing the diversity of the health care workforce, and increasing the capacity of nursing schools to admit and train students.