Rural Residency Planning and Development Program - Little Colorado Medical Center (LCMC), a 25-bed Critical Access Hospital in Winslow, Arizona, proposes to establish an Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME)-accredited Rural Family Medicine Residency Program through the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) Rural Residency Planning and Development (RRPD) Program. The residency will be sponsored by the Arizona Area Health Education Centers (AzAHEC) Program and developed in partnership with Winslow Indian Health Care Center (WIHCC), a tribally governed 638 health organization serving Native American and other rural populations throughout northeastern Arizona. Navajo County is one of Arizona's most underserved regions. More than 40 percent of its approximately 110,000 residents are Native American, and much of the county is designated as both a Primary Care Health Professional Shortage Area (HPSA) and a Medically Underserved Area/Population (MUA/P). Residents experience significant health disparities, including high rates of diabetes, hypertension, obesity, behavioral health conditions, substance use disorders, and maternal health inequities. Geographic isolation, persistent poverty, and a shortage of primary care and behavioral health providers limit access to timely, comprehensive care. LCMC and WIHCC continue to rely on temporary physicians to meet community needs, reflecting the absence of a sustainable local physician workforce pipeline. The proposed residency program will address these challenges by developing a community-based graduate medical education program that prepares physicians for comprehensive rural practice. Residents will receive longitudinal training in outpatient family medicine, inpatient care, emergency medicine, obstetrics, behavioral health integration, chronic disease management, and culturally responsive care within rural, frontier, and tribal healthcare settings. The partnership between LCMC and WIHCC provides a unique opportunity for residents to gain meaningful experience caring for Native American populations while learning to deliver high-quality, culturally responsive care in medically underserved communities. During the RRPD planning period, project activities will include development of the residency curriculum, recruitment and development of faculty, establishment of governance and consortium agreements, preparation for ACGME accreditation, financial sustainability planning, implementation of evaluation and quality improvement processes, and development of resident recruitment strategies. These activities will position the program to successfully matriculate its inaugural class of Family Medicine residents following accreditation. The long-term goals of this project are to increase the supply of rural family physicians, improve recruitment and retention of providers in northeastern Arizona, expand access to high-quality primary care, reduce dependence on locum tenens physicians, strengthen healthcare services for tribal and rural communities, and improve health outcomes through a sustainable, community-based physician workforce. By creating a Rural Family Medicine Residency Program in Winslow, LCMC and its partners will establish a lasting pipeline of physicians committed to serving Arizona's rural and Native American communities.
