Value-Based Medical Student Education Training Program - The Association of American Medical Colleges estimates that by 2030, the United States will face a shortage of up to 50,000 primary care physicians. The state of New Jersey is in the top quintile of states with a projected primary care physician shortage. It has both rural and urban medically underserved areas. Cooper Medical School of Rowan University (CMSRU) is a fully accredited, public, community-based medical school located in southern New Jersey. Our mission is to provide humanistic education in the art and science of medicine within a scientific and scholarly community in which inclusivity, excellence in patient care, innovative teaching, research, and service to our community are valued. CMSRU is recognized for providing excellent education in primary care with almost 50% percent of each graduating class entering primary care residencies. The intent of our proposed medical student education project (MSE), entitled “Expansion and Regionalization of an Accelerated Three-Year Medical School Curriculum for Primary Care” is to expand our current three-year accelerated medical education program (developed from HRSA grant TOBHP28580) for students interested in primary care internal medicine and primary care pediatrics to include family medicine and regionalize the program to include an additional large healthcare system partner in southern New Jersey, Inspira Health along with Cooper University Healthcare (CUHC), CMSRU’s primary academic affiliate. Both Inspira Health and CUHC are private entities. Students in the program will be recruited from rural and urban medically underserved areas in New Jersey, predominately. Upon acceptance into the medical school program, students will also get a provisional acceptance into a primary care internal medicine residency, a primary care pediatric residency, or a family medicine residency at Cooper University Healthcare or Inspira Health— creating a pipeline and continuum from entry into medical school to ultimate practice. The CMSRU/CUHC primary care internal medicine and primary care pediatrics residency programs were developed using funding from HRSA grants T89HP20828 and T89HP20845, respectively. CMSRU’s MSE program will have both an urban and a rural focus. Experiential clinical training for both medical students and residents will occur in academic and community-based settings including a federally qualified health center. The curriculum will prepare participants to be excellent primary care physicians and to demonstrate cultural competency. Matriculated students who commit to primary care, will receive significant scholarship support and graduating residents will be eligible for loan forgiveness offered by our partnering healthcare systems if they agree to practice within those systems. The goal of the CMSRU MSE program is to increase the number of primary care physicians practicing in the state of New Jersey. The objectives are: 1. To recruit, retain, and graduate medical students from rural and urban medically underserved communities who are interested in practicing in these areas following residency training; 2. Increase the number of CMSRU graduates who select residency programs in family medicine, general internal medicine, and general pediatrics, to increase the primary care physician workforce in rural and urban medically underserved communities; and 3. To develop or enhanced partnerships, including rotations in primary care at Teaching Health Centers or community-based settings to collaborate on educational and training activities for CMSRU medical students. Cooper Medical School of Rowan University is requesting public – private partnership funding preference for this project.
