Telehealth Network Grant Program - Project Title: Connecting Nutrition, Building Healthier Communities: A Rural Telehealth MNT Network Apostle Group, d/b/a Bethesda Newtrition and Wellness (BNWS), requests $291,209 in Year 1 ($1,456,769 over five years) to establish a Maryland telehealth Medical Nutrition Therapy (MNT) network serving rural and medically underserved communities in Garrett County and Somerset County. Both Year 1 originating sites carry federal rural and Medically Underserved Area designations: Mountain Laurel Medical Center, a Federally Qualified Health Center in Garrett County, and Somerset Primary Care, LLC, a primary care practice in Somerset County, where 100% of the county population resides in a designated MUA. The network connects BNWS registered dietitians to enrolled patients via telehealth, supported by 1.15 FTE of Community Health Worker capacity — more than double the NOFO minimum — provided through subrecipient partnerships with AHEC West and Eastern Shore AHEC (ESAHEC), both regional centers of the University of Maryland School of Medicine's Maryland AHEC Program, plus an existing practice CHW at Somerset Primary Care. All four Year 1 network partners (AHEC West, ESAHEC, Mountain Laurel Medical Center, Somerset Primary Care, LLC) are classified as subrecipients under 2 CFR 200.331, with signed MOUs or a signed letter of support already in hand. The Project projects enrollment scaling toward up to ~400 cumulative unique patients by Year 5, based on current site referral capacity, with a target HbA1c reduction of at least 0.5 points among enrolled diabetes patients. Care addresses six chronic disease focus areas — diabetes, obesity, cardiovascular disease, chronic kidney disease, Alpha-Gal Syndrome, and malnutrition — through RD-delivered MNT, a CDC-recognized Diabetes Prevention Program, group counseling, caregiver training, and CHW-delivered screening and navigation, integrated with remote patient monitoring via API into BNWS's Office Ally EHR. BNWS is also an existing, integrated participant in CRISP, Maryland's statewide Health Information Exchange; both Year 1 originating sites — Somerset Primary Care, LLC and Mountain Laurel Medical Center — are already CRISP-connected, giving the Project live rural HIE data-exchange relationships at launch, aligned with Maryland's $168 million federal Rural Health Transformation Program (RHTP, CMS/HHS, December 2025). Year 1 is phased: Months 1–4 for curriculum development and CHW training; Month 5 onward for patient enrollment. The Project is led by Livleen Gill, RDN, Immediate Past President of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics and an AMA RUC/HCPAC Advisor, with Co-Clinical Directors Lucille Beseler, MS, RDN, LDN, FAND (Past President, Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics; Dietetics/MNT/Billing/Curriculum) and Dr. Howard Haft, MD, MMM, CPE, FACPE (Medical; former Executive Director, CMMI Maryland Primary Care Program). BNWS has delivered telehealth services since 2020 and has a demonstrated track record serving vulnerable populations under three prior federal and state awards — ACL Award No. 90INNU0025, an Older Americans Act malnutrition subcontract (CFDA 93.048), and CMMI Agreement No. CTO0093 — with no corrective actions or audit findings incurred under any of them. Sustainability combines Medicare/commercial billing, permanent AHEC workforce infrastructure, statewide CHW curriculum integration through MAHEC, and state HIE infrastructure (CRISP) that persists independent of the grant period, with national dissemination through the AHEC network in Year 2.
