For immediate release: June 12, 2007
Contact: Emily Wofford Cobb
Communications Manager
775-784-6006
ecobb@medicine.nevada.edu
School of Medicine awarded more than $200,000 to establish the Nevada Advanced Life Support for Obstetrics Training Program
Program to provide obstetrics training to healthcare practitioners across the state
LAS VEGAS, Nev.—The University of Nevada School of Medicine Department of Family and Community Medicine received a two-year grant of more than $200,000 from the State Trust Fund for Public Health to establish the Nevada Advanced Life Support for Obstetrics (ALSO) Training Program. The program, dubbed ALSO, will provide a two-day certified training program for healthcare practitioners across the state to help prevent and manage medical emergencies in obstetrical care and delivery.
“The ALSO program does not currently exist in Nevada,” stated Elissa Palmer, M.D., author of the grant and professor of family and community medicine. “We believe that by instituting this program we will be able to substantially contribute to the number of physicians and medical personnel willing to continue to deliver babies within the state.”
Palmer, who is Nevada’s only certified ALSO faculty instructor, course director and advisor, cites many critical factors that contribute to the large number of medical emergencies and complicated deliveries of newborns within the state. Among those factors are the high costs of malpractice insurance, shortages of physicians in rural areas, distances rural women must travel for maternity care and increasing minority populations who are often unable to seek timely obstetric care. Standardized training in the management of emergency obstetrical situations can significantly increase patient’s access to safe, quality care, particularly, in Nevada’s rural and frontier communities. ALSO training for family medicine physicians and nurse midwives can improve their ability to respond to emergencies in obstetrical care. The training can also better prepare rural emergency medicine physicians to deal with unexpected problems and stabilize patients until physicians with obstetrical experience arrive.
University of Nevada School of Medicine family medicine and obstetrics and gynecology departments in Reno and Las Vegas will collaborate in organizing and recruiting family medicine physicians, obstetricians, nurse midwives, obstetrical nurses, and emergency medicine physicians throughout Nevada to receive training and become ALSO certified providers.
As the state’s only public medical school, the University of Nevada School of Medicine has been meeting statewide healthcare, educational, and clinical needs since 1969. The School of Medicine encompasses 16 clinical medical education departments, including Family Medicine, Pediatrics, Obstetrics/Gynecology, Internal Medicine, Surgery, and Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, as well as ten nationally-recognized departments within basic science including microbiology and biomedical engineering. As the largest multi-specialty healthcare focus within the state, the School of Medicine employs more than 185 doctors who both teach and practice medicine throughout Nevada. The school’s statewide faculty physician practice group has a combined 25 different medical specialties with seven physician practice offices located in the Reno-Sparks area and five physician offices located in Las Vegas.
The University of Nevada School of Medicine utilizes a best-practice approach to medicine and is committed to addressing the health needs of Nevada now and in the future. For more information, please visit www.medicine.nevada.edu.
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