Grants to help fund health programs
GREENVILLE, N.C. (July 6, 2004) — East Carolina University programs such as a diabetes fellowship for physicians and a pediatric healthy weight program were among local projects that received more than $1.45 million in grants from The Duke Endowment, the Charlotte-based foundation announced in June.
The grants and other funds went to University Health Systems of Eastern Carolina and the Eastern Area Health Education Center.
The grants will help fund projects aimed at improving the care of people with heart failure, diabetes and other illnesses. Some of the grants are continuing funding of projects the endowment funded in previous years.
Following is a list of the grants and brief summaries of the projects they fund:
–$175,828 for Pitt County Memorial Hospital to assist in the first year of a three-year period to establish a diabetes fellowship program. This program will be led by Dr. Robert Tanenberg, an endocrinologist and professor of internal medicine at the Brody School of Medicine at East Carolina University.
–$523,384 for PCMH to assist in the first year of a three-year period to develop a pediatric healthy weight case management program. Surveys show as many as a third of eastern North Carolina children are obese. This program will involve experts with the Brody School of Medicine and other areas of ECU, the ViQuest Center, private practice pediatricians and others.
–$184,000 for the Eastern Area Health Education Center to assist in the third year of a three-year period to develop a statewide education program to increase the ability of school nurses to address mental health issues of students. This project consists of training and continuing education of school nurses and other school staff including the development of a “train-the-trainer” component and regional training curriculum, development of a resource directory of experts in school mental health topics to provide training to public school personnel, implementation of Web-based instruction and expansion of online resources and materials.
–$116,274 for Eastern AHEC to assist in the second year of a two-year period to support the Health Sciences Academy of Pitt County. This grant funding comes to Eastern AHEC, which contracts with Pitt County Schools to fund the academy administrative and support roles. Along with Eastern AHEC, academy partners are UHS, ECU, Pitt Community College and the Greenville-Pitt County Chamber of Commerce.
–$125,000 for Heritage Hospital in Tarboro to assist in the first year of a three-year period in establishing a chronic heart failure clinic. The goal of this program is to improve the quality of life in patients with heart failure and to prevent frequent hospitalization and recurrent emergency room visits. The program also will increase awareness of the disease and available treatment. Dr. Hassan Alhosaini, an internist, leads the program.
–$257,988 for the Bertie Memorial Hospital Auxiliary in Windsor to assist in the second year of a three-year period to develop an electronic medical record system to improve community-based care for chronic disease management. This installment is part of an overall grant of $781,801 to develop community-based care for chronic disease using electronic medical records at BMH.
The Duke Endowment also granted the following amounts to UHS hospitals to help pay for the care of indigent patients:
–$258 to Bertie Memorial.
–$8,177 to Chowan Hospital in Edenton.
–$10,285 to Roanoke-Chowan Hospital in Ahoskie.
–$6,479 Heritage Hospital.
–$45,616 to PCMH.
The grants were part of more than $29.3 million the endowment handed out to organizations in North and South Carolina last PCMH County Memorial Hospital, regional hospitals, physician practices and is affiliated with the Brody School of Medicine at ECU.