: The Cecil G. Sheps Center for Health Services Research at the University of North Carolina (UNC) is pleased to submit to AHRQ a competing renewal application for its NRSA T-32 pre-and post-doctoral training program in health services research. Since initiated in 1989, the program is currently authorized for 4 pre- and 2 postdoctoral fellows. Although all trainees are affiliated as fellows with the Sheps Center, all pre-doctoral students are first admitted as candidates to the PhD or DrPH degree in collaborating academic departments at UNC such as Health Policy and Administration, Epidemiology, Health Behavior and Health Education, Biostatistics, Maternal and Child Health, Nutrition, Economics, Geography, Sociology, Pharmaceutical Policy, or Public Policy. Postdoctoral candidates may also be drawn from medical or dental disciplines. Among the proposed changes in the program for this 5-year renewal are: request for one additional predoctoral and one additional postdoctoral position;enhanced linkages to the numerous AHRQ programmatic intiatives at the Sheps Center (EPC, DEclDE, ACTION and PBRN);collaboration with UNC's planned CTSA initiative in type II (bedside to community) translational research;a new relationship with the North Carolina Institute of Medicine (NC-IOM) to expose fellows to the state-based policy process;and ongoing emphasis on research in health disparities paralleling the broad efforts ongoing at the Sheps Center and at UNC. Trainees will participate in weekly seminars as well as additional targeted educational experiences on ethics. Trainees will have office space in and be exposed to the activities of the Sheps Center, a-university-based multidisciplinary center with over 60 active projects and an annual budget of $13 million, with funding through NIH, AHRQ, states and foundations. Projects at the Sheps Center are in a range of content areas including: aging, rural health, child health, health economics, health care organization and medical practice. Dr. Timothy S. Carey will continue as.the program director, assisted by five core faculty members: Drs. Christianna Williams (associate director), James Bader, Bob Konrad, Mark Holmes (new to the program) and Morris Weinberger. The availability of this training support is a critical component of health services research and training in multiple schools at the University of North Carolina, leading to later successful careers in academics and health policy.
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