We would like to welcome all of this month's new Ambassadors to the program.

Ambassador Joan Beatty-Lee is the Youth Programs Coordinator at the Gulfcoast South Area Health Education Center Inc. in Sarasota , FL.

Ambassador Pamela Clark is the Assistant Director of Admissions at Indiana University School of Dentistry in Indianapolis , IN.

Ambassador Isabella Finkelstein is a Professor and the Health Professions Advisor at Clark Atlanta University in Atlanta , Georgia .

Ambassador Andy Grimm is the Chief Operations Officer for the Northeast Missouri Health Council, Inc. in Kirksville , MO.

Ambassador John Wiecha is the Director of PreDoctoral Education in the Department of Family Medicine at Boston University School of Medicine in Boston , MA .

Ambassador Debra Curry , Executive Director of the Southwestern Area Health Education Center (SW AHEC), recently received the West Virginia “Caperton Award for an Outstanding Rural Health Project.” This award recognizes a community-wide program which targets an identified weakness in the community's health system and is effectively addressing it in a quantifiably.

The Southwestern Area Health Education Center's K-12 and pre-med pipeline program, under the leadership of Debbie Curry has been working with middle and high school students and pre-medical students to identify innovative ways to educate rural students about the benefits of health center careers in West Virginia and to give them the tools needed to pursue careers.

The program has reached a total number of 2,680 middle and high school students from August 2003 to June 2007 from all 10 counties in the SW AHEC region. As a result of this program, thirteen pre-med students were afforded the opportunity to participate in a pilot project on interdisciplinary teams at the SW AHEC. Ten of those students recently graduated from college, nine of whom are currently enrolled in medical school in West Virginia.

Ambassador MaryAnn Miller, Chief, Office of Primary Care at the Rhode Island Department of Health, shared the following the success story regarding the SEARCH program in Rhode Island . A second year resident, Dr. Matthew Burke, participated at the Chad Brown Health Center (an FQHC Look-A-Like) with Dr. Fadi ElRayess on a research project at the site that won a Rhode Island Quality Partner's Improvement Grant worth $1,000. The grant is designed to go to continuing research at that site, which will contribute to the continued viability of the clinic. Essentially, the project found that with the implementation of an electronic medical records system at the site, there was a significant rise mammography screening across all ethnic groups. The team looked at all women in the clinic ages 40-80 and analyzed their mammography screening rates compared to 2005 figures and against Rhode Island and national figures.

Keep up the good work!

As the NHSC Ambassador Program continues its ongoing efforts to recruit dedicated Campus and Community Ambassadors, we encourage our existing Ambassadors to also “spread the word” about the Ambassador Program to colleagues and friends.

For information on the types of Campus and Community Ambassadors the NHSC recruits for, as well as information on registration, visit Ambassadors Registration.

Because of many of your efforts, the Ambassador program is now up to 938 Ambassadors strong!