Letter from the Chancellor As you will read in this report, Arkansas already has one of the oldest populations in the country. Older patients typically need more care. Our state also has regularly been identified as one of the unhealthiest, with high incidences of diabetes and obesity, which further increase the need for health care. At the same time, hospitals, medical clinics and nursing homes are unable to fill nursing and other positions. In some rural areas, health care access remains an issue in part because there are not enough trained workers to staff the facilities. The danger is that Arkansas’ overburdened health care system will not be able to meet increased demand as more and more of the baby boomers reach retirement age. As the state’s only academic health sciences campus, UAMS is committed to meeting the health care challenges of the future by educating and retaining graduates in numbers sufficient to meet the majority of Arkansas’ health care work force needs. UAMS is already expanding its enrollment and its programs. In addition, we are considering what changes in infrastructure or health care funding might be necessary to meet our education and work force goals. We produced this report to illustrate the factors driving these changes. Just as in 1879, when eight physicians scraped together the money to start the medical school that would grow into UAMS, we are looking to our resources to see what is necessary to deliver the type of health care Arkansans need and deserve in the years to come.
I. Dodd Wilson, M.D. |
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