NC Rural Health Research and Policy Analysis General Information

The North Carolina Rural Health Research Program (NC RHRP) is built on the thirty-five year history of rural health services research at the University of North Carolina's Cecil G. Sheps Center for Health Services Research. The program draws on the experience of a wide variety of scholars and researchers, analysts, managers and health service providers associated with the Center. The Program also has an ongoing partnership with the NC Foundation for Advanced Health Programs, Inc. of the Office of Research, Demonstrations and Rural Health Development in the NC Department of Human Resources.

The NC RHRP is working to identify problems in the rural health arena through policy-relevant analyses, the geographic and graphical presentation of data, and the dissemination of information to organizations and individuals in the health care field who can use this information for policy or administrative purposes. The Program's research involves primary data collection, analysis of large secondary data sets, and in-depth policy analysis. The Program brings together a diverse, multidisciplinary team including clinicians in medicine, nursing, pharmacy, allied health, mental health, and other professions and disciplines along with experts in biostatistics, geography, epidemiology, sociology, anthropology and political science to address complex social issues affecting rural populations.

The Program's present policy analysis and research agenda focuses on the following substantive areas: measures of underservice, Medicare reimbursement policy, Medicaid, and access to care. The Program also has an active dissemination component and emphasizes the use of geographic methods in research.

Nested within the NC RHRP is the North Carolina Rural Health Research and Policy Analysis Center (NC RHR & PAC), one of three federally-designated policy analytic centers funded by the Federal Office of Rural Health Policy, Health Resources and Services Administration, Public Health Service, US DHHS Grant No. 1UICRH03714-01-00. The NC RHRP is also funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the W. K. Kellogg Foundation, the State of North Carolina, and FirstHealth of the Carolinas.

	Tim Carey, MD Cecil G. Sheps Center for Health Services Research University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill	Gordon DeFriese, Ph.D. Cecil G. Sheps Center for Health Services Research University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
	Glenn Wilson Cecil G. Sheps Center for Health Services Research University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill	John Hatch, Dr.P.H. Professor, Dept. of Health Education North Carolina Central University
	Kerry Kilpatrick, Ph.D. Professor and Chairman Dept. of Health Policy and Administration University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill	Donald Madison, M.D. Professor, Social Medicine School of Medicine University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

	Robert E. Hurley, Ph.D. Associate Professor, Department of Health Administration Medical College of Virginia Virginia Commonwealth University	Jeanne M. Lambrew, Ph.D. Associate Professor of Health Servcies Management and Policy George Washington University
	Bryan Ayars. M.S. NH Dept. of Rural Health and Primary Care NH State Office of Rural Health	Steven R. Shelton, M.B.A,PA-C The University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston East Texas Area Health Education Center
	Roger Thompson, C.P.A. Johnson Sestak and Quist LLP	Anothony Wellever,MA Vice President for Policy Kansas Health Institute

North Carolina Rural Health Research Program
Cecil G. Sheps Center for Health Services Research
725 Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., CB 7590 UNC-CH
Chapel Hill, NC 27599-7590
Phone: 919-966-5541 FAX: 919-966-5764
World Wide Web address: www.shepscenter.unc.edu
Send E-Mail to NC RHR & PAC Director, Dr. Rebecca Slifkin or E-Mail NC RHR & PAC Project Manager, Indira Richardson

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