Friday, November 22, 2024
11/22/2024
Access to primary medical, oral, behavioral health care, and substance use disorder (SUD) services is a necessity for maintaining good public health, yet over one million Coloradans live in a community with less than half of the primary care clinicians needed to optimally deliver primary health care services. Despite significant gains in coverage achieved through the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, limited access to primary care services persists among the hundreds of thousands of Coloradans who use safety net clinics as their regular source of care. The purpose of the Colorado Health Service Corps (CHSC) is to improve the health of Colorado's medically underserved populations by reducing health disparities resulting from poor access to primary medical, oral, behavioral health care, and substance use disorder services. The Colorado Primary Care Office (PCO) will achieve this purpose by repaying educational loan debt held by licensed primary medical, oral, behavioral health, and SUD clinicians. These clinicians will be obligated to three years of clinical practice working in nonprofit or public safety net clinics. There, they will serve low-income, publicly insured, uninsured, and geographically isolated Coloradans in federally-designated health professional shortage areas. As measured annually and at the conclusion of the project, State Loan Repayment Program (SLRP) grant funds will achieve three project objectives: the Colorado PCO will facilitate recruitment of clinicians to medically underserved communities for clinical practice through the CHSC, retain CHSC clinicians in those communities, and evaluate program policies to enhance effectiveness with respect to the first two objectives. The PCO will utilize federal, state, and private funds in order to maximize the impact of these efforts, increasing access to care for Colorado’s medically underserved. These project objectives will support the intended purpose of the SLRP, w hich is to provide loan repayment awards to health care providers in exchange for service in underserved communities.
HHS’ Tracking Accountability in Government Grants System (TAGGS) website provides access to detailed descriptions of grants, loans, aggregated direct payments and other types of financial assistance awarded by the HHS Operating Divisions (OPDIVs) and the Office of the Secretary Staff Divisions (STAFFDIVs).
