Last week, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services awarded more than $35 million to 44 organizations in 29 states to support quality care for older Americans through the Geriatrics Workforce Enhancement Program. Words for Good client, Indiana University (IU) School of Medicine, was selected to receive $850,000 per year for three years—the maximum award allowable plus additional funds for Alzheimer’s disease and related dementia education—for its Interprofessional Geriatrics Education and Training Center (IGETC). The purpose of IGETC is to develop a health care workforce in Indiana that maximizes patient and family engagement and improves health outcomes for older adults by integrating geriatrics with primary care.
IGETC will focus on serving more than 5,000 older adults in the Indianapolis metropolitan area who receive primary care within eight community health centers across the city. Project goals will be to improve health care for these older adults in underserved primary care settings, address the learning and support needs of these older adults, and prepare the incoming health care workforce to effectively assess and address the needs of older adults and their caregivers by annually training 65 primary care medical residents and 240 medical, advanced practice, and master of social work students.
The project will be led by the IU Geriatrics program, a nationally recognized leader in interprofessional, patient-centered geriatrics education and will build on the program’s innovative models of collaborative care that integrate medical and social care, education and support older adults and their families and caregivers, and reduce emergency department visits and hospitalizations. Project partners include IU School of Nursing, IU School of Social Work, IU Center for Interprofessional Health Education & Practice, Eskenazi Health, IU Health, Richard L. Roudebush VA Medical Center, CICOA Aging & In-Home Solutions, and the Alzheimer’s Association.
The full list of Geriatric Workforce Enhancement Program awardees can be found here. Congratulations, IU School of Medicine!
