As we proceed to answer the COVID-19 pandemic as a nation, it has been made clear that we’re additionally within the midst of a vital public well being workforce shortage. The pandemic has highlighted key areas for enhancing the nation’s public well being infrastructure and growing the variety of extremely skilled public well being informatics and expertise professionals. In January 2021, the Biden-Harris Administration launched an Executive Order to create a unified public well being workforce technique that can broaden and construct capability so we will higher reply to future pandemics and organic threats. In September 2021, ONC launched the ONC Public Well being Informatics & Know-how Workforce Growth Program (PHIT Workforce Program) to assist deal with these points.
ONC chosen ten awardees from throughout the nation that signify a mixture of Traditionally Black Schools and Universities, Hispanic-Serving Establishments, and Asian American and Native American Pacific Islander-Serving Establishments. Collectively, these awardees will collectively prepare greater than 4,000 people in public well being informatics and expertise over a interval of 4 years. The PHIT Workforce Program helps a variety of actions throughout establishments, from supporting utterly new applications to increasing present applications together with certificates, undergraduate, and graduate applications.
ONC acknowledges that growing a workforce with competencies in public well being informatics and expertise is vital. Information about knowledge similar to laboratory outcomes, mattress availability, and digital well being data on the proper place and on the proper time are important throughout a pandemic. A various and knowledge technology-savvy public well being workforce can contribute to extra equitable public well being actions, with the potential to yield higher well being outcomes.
PHIT Progress to Date
Whereas we’re solely six months into the PHIT Workforce Program we’re excited to share some robust preliminary progress made by our awardees. They’re constructing survey and evaluation instruments to higher perceive the competencies wanted for quite a lot of public well being informatics roles; bringing a various set of private and non-private employers to the desk to develop modern methods to recruit college students and create internship alternatives; and are making strides to maneuver their curricula by way of the formal accreditation processes inside their establishments and exterior boards.
We’re grateful for the dedication of the awardees, and their consortium companions, who’re working to convey related curricula to their college students. Some highlights embrace:
- The College of Texas is growing bootcamp-style coaching for his or her undergraduate college students.
- The College of Minnesota, leveraging relationships established previous to the award, is partnering with universities in Florida and Georgia to implement their curriculum throughout each undergraduate and graduate applications.
- Jackson State College is engaged on implementing applications that develop the pipeline of expertise from highschool to school.
- California State College at Lengthy Seashore is growing a multi-pronged method to organize numerous college students to enter the PHIT workforce, particularly specializing in gaps recognized by the California Division of Public Well being.
These are only a few examples, however you’ll be able to study extra concerning the modern methods and applications on ONC’s PHIT Workforce Development Program page.
ONC Public Well being Informatics and Know-how Workforce Growth Program Awardees
This map consists of the ten PHIT Workforce Growth Applications award recipients.
