Rural Project Examples: Frontier and remote areas

Effective Examples

The Health-able Communities Program

Updated/reviewed August 2024

• Need: Expand healthcare access for the more remote residents of 3 frontier counties in north central Idaho.
• Intervention: With early federal grant-funding, a consortium of healthcare providers and community agencies used a hybrid Community Health Worker model to augment traditional healthcare delivery services in order to offer a diverse set of health-related interventions to frontier area residents.
• Results: With additional private grant funding, success continued to build into the current model of an established and separate CHW division within the health system's population health department.

Other Project Examples

Rural Experiences for Health Professions Students (REHPS)

Updated/reviewed July 2023

• Need: An ongoing shortage of healthcare providers in rural areas of South Dakota
• Intervention: A 4-week summer program placing health professions students in rural communities.
• Results: Of graduating participants, 71% practice in South Dakota with 30% of those graduates practicing in rural communities with populations fewer than 10,000, or veteran facilities.

Medical Home Plus

Updated/reviewed February 2020

• Need: To help reduce diabetes, depression, and stroke risk in rural residents.
• Intervention: A collaborative care model was implemented in the Idaho counties of Clearwater, Idaho, and Lewis.
• Results: Increased number of patients with controlled blood sugar, controlled blood pressure, and higher depression screening rates.