Rural areas present difficulty for health service access. Populations are scattered and dispersed over larger areas than in suburban/urban areas. Health care resources may not be accessible due to distance from the rural population. Therefore, it is difficult to use reasearch methods to examine the impact of preventive health programs on health status and behaviors of rural people. A graduate faculty member and two graduate students have worked in a mentor/mentee relationship in rural health activities. The doctoral student is focused on cancer prevention with rural African-American women. The master's student is in an FNP program. Both plan to work in rural areas when finished but experience with health service delivery or research in rural populations was limited until they participated in this rural mentor/mentee relationship. They have had the opportunity to prepare funded research proposals, work on contracts with other agencies for data collection, and participate in a program of rural research. Their activities included: creative uses of preventive strategies to reach rural workers at the work site; one to one interviews with rural people, which can be used if the provider and/or researcher is willing to travel to the rural site or is funded for time to do so; addition of preventive services during primary care visits even when the preventive focus is not the reason for such visits. Isolated people can be reached in rural areas with such a variety of approaches. The unique aspect of this mentor/mentee experience is the rural health focus of the activities.
Learning Objectives: After attending this session, the participants should be able to: 1. Describe the mentor/mentee relationship between graduate students and graduate faculty. 2. Discuss the application of mentorship to the development of research/advanced practice skills in graduate students. 3. Compare the differences and similarities of mentorship for doctoral and master's level students. 4. Identify the unique application aspects of research and service strategies in rural areas as described by mentored graduate students and their mentoring faculty advisor.
Keywords: Access and Services, Rural Populations
Presenting author's disclosure statement:
Organization/institution whose products or services will be discussed: None
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.