Regulations, Forms & Other Useful Documents
Building Rural Health Networks: Examples from the Rural Network Development Grant Program
Author(s): Anthony Wellever
Sponsoring organization: Office of Rural Health Policy
Profiles five rural networks funded in the first round of Rural Network Development Grant Program. Examples are from Washington state, Kansas, West Virginia, Florida and California. Discusses common themes and differences among these networks.
Date: 09 / 1999
Collaborations to Enhance Community and Population Well-Being
Sponsoring organization: National Advisory Committee on Rural Health and Human Services
Chapter from the 2005 Report to the Secretary: Rural Health and Human Services Issues. Discusses ways the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services can support collaborations among community organizations and local rural leaders to improve the well-being of rural communities and residents. Includes examples of successful rural collaborations.
Date: 04 / 2005
Grantee Sustainability in the Rural Health Outreach Grant Program
Author(s): Walter Gregg, Astrid Knott, Ira Moscovice
Sponsoring organization: University of Minnesota Rural Health Research Center
Describes a study of the post-grant experiences of 99 Rural Health Outreach Grant recipients. Focuses on the extent to which programs were able to maintain or expand services after their grants ended and characteristics that helped programs succeed in the post-grant period.
Date: 12 / 2003
History of the Rural Health Care Services Outreach Grant Program
Sponsoring organization: Office of Rural Health Policy
Describes the history of the Outreach Grant Program, which has had a significant impact on the health and welfare of many rural communities.
Date: 2004
Interagency Collaboration in Rural Areas
Sponsoring organization: National Child Welfare Resource Center for Organizational Improvement
Explores two approaches to interagency collaboration in rural areas, and the potential of these collaborations to improve the child welfare services available to children and families.
Journal citation: Child Welfare Matters Volume IV Issue 2
Medicare Rural Hospital Flexibility/Critical Access Hospital Program in Pennsylvania: Success in Implementation and Collaboration
Sponsoring organization: Pennsylvania Office of Rural Health
Highlights of the PA CAH program.
Journal citation: Pennsylvania Rural Health Magazine Volume 12 Issue 2 Pages: 5
Date: 06 / 2003
Networking for Rural Health, Shared Services: The Foundation of Collaboration
Author(s): Anthony Wellever, Christina Folz
Sponsoring organization: AcademyHealth
Describes sharing and collaboration among rural health networks. Networks
bring together rural providers and possibly other agencies, employers, or community organizations to address health care problems that could not be solved by any single entity working alone.
Date: 09 / 2001
Networking for Rural Health: Science and Art of Business Planning for Rural Health Networks
Author(s): Anthony Wellever, Robert Cameron
Sponsoring organization: AcademyHealth
Discusses ways in which cooperative business planning for rural health networks differs from single-firm planning.
Date: 11 / 2000
Opportunities for Collaboration Across Human Services Programs
Sponsoring organization: Finance Project
Overview of some of the major human service programs administered at the state and local level. Discusses the interdependence of those programs, their common goals, and the way in which those programs might work together. Contributors include American Public Human Services Association, Council of State Administrators of Vocational Rehabilitation, National Association for State Community Services Programs, National Association of State Alcohol/Drug Abuse Directors, National Association of State Directors of Developmental Disabilities Services, National Association of State Directors of Special Education, National Association of State Mental Health Program Directors, National Association of State Workforce Agencies, National Association of Workforce Boards, National Child Support Enforcement Association, and the Finance Project.
Date: 06 / 2003
Organizing for Achievement: Three Rural Health Network Case Studies
Author(s): Anthony Wellever
Sponsoring organization: Office of Rural Health Policy
Three rural health networks are presented as examples. Networks within the community that include home health, pharmacy, social service agency and other partners and external cross-community networks of other hospitals and managed care networks are included. Case studies are in West Virginia, Montana and Kansas.
Date: 02 / 1999
Quality Improvement in Rural Hospitals: How Networking Can Help
Author(s): Kerry Kemp
Sponsoring organization: AcademyHealth
Discusses how rural health networks can
address quality improvement. Includes success stories and examples of quality improvement projects that networks might undertake.
Date: 08 / 2002
Quality Through Collaboration: The Future of Rural Health Care (Executive Summary)
Sponsoring organization: Institute of Medicine
Summary of an Institute of Medicine (IOM) report that examines the quality of health care in rural America. Includes key findings on rural health care quality and patient safety, as well as recommendations.
Date: 11 / 2004
Quality Through Collaboration: The Future of Rural Health Care (Full Report)
Sponsoring organization: Institute of Medicine
Examines the quality of health care in rural America. Includes recommendations to improve health care quality and safety in rural communities. Addresses workforce, information technology, finance and other factors that impact rural health care quality.
Date: 11 / 2004
Staying Connected: Building Entrepreneur Networks
Author(s): Candace Nelson
Sponsoring organization: Aspen Institute
Discusses how networking, associations, and
peer and affinity groups can support business growth and provides guidance on how to assess
the costs and benefits of these strategies.
This is Volume six of the FIELD Best Practice Guide series.
Date: 03 / 2004
Strategic Choices of Rural Health Networks: Implications for Goals and Performance Measurement
Author(s): Anthony Wellever, Douglas Wholey, Tiffany Radcliff
Sponsoring organization: University of Minnesota Rural Health Research Center
The purpose of this study is to obtain a greater understanding of rural health networks by
classifying them according to their functions and purposes. Examples of performance measures that might be used for the different network types are given.
Date: 01 / 2000
Strategic Planning for Rural Health Networks
Author(s): Katherine Browne, Daniel Campion, Robert Stenger
Sponsoring organization: AcademyHealth
Discusses how to approach strategic planning in the context of a rural health network.
Date: 03 / 2001
Strength of Internet Ties
Author(s): Jeffrey Boase, John B. Horrigan, Barry Wellman, Lee Rainie
Sponsoring organization: Pew Internet and American Life Project
Highlights how the Internet, particularly email, supplements the communication people have with others in their network who are geographically dispersed. Extended networks appear to be beneficial in helping people face problems or make significant decisions, such as those related to career changes and education.
Date: 01 / 2006
Strengthening Tribal/State Collaborations: Opportunities for Further Direction
Sponsoring organization: Welfare Peer Technical Assistance Network
Provides peer technical assistance from tribes and states operating TANF/NEW programs. Highlights of a two day workshop.
Date: 09 / 2002
Toward a Single Coherent Vision: Sustaining Interdepartmental Collaboration to Support Community Integration for Persons with Disabilities
Author(s): Eileen Griffin
Sponsoring organization: Center for Health Care Strategies
Discusses methods to coordinate and integrate human services for persons with disabilities across state agencies in Maine.
Date: 10 / 2002
Working Together: Rural Nebraskans' Views of Regional Collaboration
Author(s): John C. Allen, Rebecca Vogt, Randolph L. Cantrell
Sponsoring organization: Center for Applied Rural Innovation
Discusses rural Nebraskans' perceptions of regional collaboration, including sharing services with other communities and collaboration of businesses and institutions across communities.
Date: 09 / 2003
Organizations
Georgia Health Policy Center
State/regional organization
Works to improve the health status of all Georgians through research, policy development, and program design and evaluation.
National Rural Health Association (NRHA)
National organization
Promotes leadership, ideas, information, communication, education, research, advocacy, and methods to improve rural health. Composed of individual and organizational members who share a common interest in rural health.
Office of Rural Health Policy (ORHP)
Federal government
Promotes better health care service in rural America. Part of the Health Resources and Services Administration, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Focuses on matters affecting rural hospitals and health care, coordinating activities within the department that relate to rural health care, and maintaining a national information clearinghouse.
Terms & Acronyms
Collaboration The process by which people or organizations work together to accomplish a common mission.
Community A specific group of people, often living in a defined geographical area, who share a common culture, values, and norms and who are arranged in a social structure according to relationships the community has developed over a period of time.
Contractual Relating to or part of a binding legal agreement; "contractual obligations."
Gentleman's Agreement An agreement based on honor rather than on a formal contract and thus not legally binding.
Horizontal Network A network composed of similar types of entities, such as an all-hospital or all-nursing home network, that serve different geographic markets.
Integration Two or more organizations arrange to have a least one service from each contribute to the same program.
Legal Established by or founded upon law or official or accepted rules.
Networking The exchange of information or services among individuals, groups, or institutions.
Regionalization The identification of available resources within a geographic area, and the coordination of services to meet the needs of a specific group of patients.
Rural Health Network A formal organizational
arrangement among rural health
care providers (and possibly others) that
uses the resources of more than one existing
organization and specifies the objectives
and methods by which various collaborative
functions are achieved.
Vertical Network A network formed with organizations from different classes or with different purposes such as a network made up of a hospital, public health unit, nursing home, and ambulance system.
