Rural Project Examples: Health occupations
Other Project Examples
Healthy Mujeres in the Texas Rio Grande Valley
Added December 2024
- Need: To provide basic pregnancy-related and preventive health services to women in the Texas Rio Grande Valley.
- Intervention: A mobile clinic travels to different communities and provides basic preventive care, contraception, and pregnancy testing and ultrasounds.
- Results: Since the program began, clinical staff have provided services to nearly 6,000 women.
Marshall University Rural Psychiatry Residency Program
Added December 2024
- Need: To train the next generation of psychiatrists in a rural context, while providing psychiatric care to an underserved region of West Virginia.
- Intervention: A new rural psychiatry residency program at Marshall University, in which residents split their time between the rural town of Point Pleasant and the larger city of Huntington.
- Results: The program welcomed its first class of residents in July 2024.
Mobile Integrated Healthcare Network (MIHN)

Updated/reviewed October 2024
- Need: To bring preventive care and other services to rural Missouri patients with chronic illnesses and difficulties accessing primary care.
- Intervention: Community paramedics and community health workers make home visits and provide basic care, home assessments, and medication reconciliation and facilitate telehealth visits.
- Results: Patients experienced improved access to care, health status, and compliance with medication regimens along with increased patient engagement, satisfaction, and access to community resources.
Rural Firefighters Delivering Agricultural Safety and Health (RF-DASH)
Updated/reviewed October 2024
- Need: To reduce injuries in agricultural communities and improve emergency responders' preparedness when called to farms and ranches.
- Intervention: RF-DASH equips rural fire/EMS personnel and others with agricultural health and safety knowledge and tools to pre-plan for agricultural emergencies as well as assess and then mitigate agricultural hazards.
- Results: Over 150 firefighters and EMTs have received training to become RF-DASH trainers.
COSSA Advanced EMT Class
Added July 2024
- Need: To increase the number of Advanced Emergency Medical Technicians (Advanced EMTs) in rural Idaho and neighboring states.
- Intervention: An Advanced EMT class offered to students at five rural high schools, the first of its kind in the country.
- Results: Two students graduated from the class in its first year, with at least two more expected to enroll in the 2024-25 school year.
Rural Libraries and Health Cooperative Agreement
Updated/reviewed July 2024
- Need: To increase access to healthcare and social services in rural South Carolina via library systems.
- Intervention: Pilot sites are hiring social workers and community health workers to provide consultations, case management, and referrals.
- Results: One library screens an average of 215 residents a month, and another library's programming reached over 800 female patrons.
Tooth B.U.D.D.S.
Added July 2024
- Need: To increase access to preventive dental care among children living in rural Arizona.
- Intervention: A nonprofit organization formed to offer free, school-based preventive dental services to children in two rural Arizona counties.
- Results: Throughout the 2023-24 school year, Tooth B.U.D.D.S. provided preventive services to 1,710 students in rural Graham and Greenlee Counties. Program staff use a telehealth platform to connect children to local dentists for follow-up care.
Regional Initiatives in Dental Education (RIDE)

Updated/reviewed June 2024
- Need: Address oral health disparities in Washington's rural communities.
- Intervention: The University of Washington School of Dentistry (UWSOD) developed the Regional Initiatives in Dental Education (RIDE) program to increase the number of dentists prepared for the various languages and custom-specific attitudes concerning oral health in addition to the clinical competence required to practice in rural areas.
- Results: Since its start in 2009 and as of 2024, nearly 100 dentists have completed the program with over 81% practicing in rural communities.
AGRIMEDIC
Updated/reviewed February 2024
- Need: To reduce farm injuries and improve EMS and fire/rescue's response to these injuries in rural Louisiana and Mississippi.
- Intervention: AGRIMEDIC is a two-day training for first responders.
- Results: 810 first responders have received training.
Premera Rural Nursing Health Initiative at the University of Washington
Added January 2024
- Need: To create rural clinical placement and postgraduate fellowship opportunities for Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) students and recent Advanced Registered Nurse Practitioner (ARNP) graduates in Washington.
- Intervention: The Rural Nursing Health Initiative (RNHI), a program out of the University of Washington School of Nursing that created clinical placement opportunities for DNP students and a postgraduate fellowship program for ARNP graduates.
- Results: Rural clinical stipends have been awarded to 80 DNP students, and 12 ARNPs completed rural fellowships between 2021 and 2023.
For examples from other sources, see: