UT Tyler receives over $1 million in funding for preventive medicine

Published 5:40 am Tuesday, October 17, 2023

UT Tyler received $1,091,720 from the Health Resources and Services Administration for the General Preventive Residency program, which will help the program add more residents and fund more educational opportunities.

“It’s going to be a springboard to put more preventive medicine residents in this region,” program director Dr. Peter Pendergrass said.

The program started on July 1, 2022 and is one of two general preventive medicine programs in Texas. They received grant funding in May 2023 and will cover four years. The program accepts two residents per year and will expand to three residents. In the end, they will have six total, according to Pendergrass.

“We’re looking for physicians of all different types that are interested in this opportunity in preventive medicine,” said Dr. Michelle Crum, Assistant Professor of the School of Health Professionals. “The exciting thing about that is it allows us to meet people where they are and go into the communities and serve that need.”

The grant will help with being able to send residents to training outside of the region. Some of the training the grant will fund includes an emergency preparedness training in the Rio Grande Valley with Operation Border Health Preparedness, a smoking cessation training at and a survivorship focused on secondary cancer at, MD Anderson in Houston, according to Pendergrass.

“Many cancers are preventable, either through good behavioral health where people eat well and exercise, those kinds of activities that have a positive effect on reducing cancer rates,” Pendergrass said. “But it also will allow them to really understand how you screen for these diseases and to help prevent it that way.”

East Texas has high rates of uninsured people, lack of access in rural areas and many health needs, according to Pendergrass. The 2021 Northeast Texas Health Status Report showed this region has higher rates than the rates statewide.

“If Northeast Texas were a state, among states it would have ranked 47th in heart disease mortality, 48th in cancer mortality, 50th in stroke mortality, 51st in chronic lower respiratory disease mortality and 44th in death from all causes,” according to the health status report.

UT Tyler School of Medicine Dean Brigham Willis is excited about the grant and believes it will lead to a more collaborative care model where you could go see your primary doctor, then after see a preventive doctor about healthy eating.

The grant links them with a Federally Qualified Health Center, Family Circle of Care, where they will be working with a quality person to do quality improvement data analysis and population projects, according to Pendergrass.

In the future, the program wants to have a tobacco cessation program with the school of psychology that their residents can participate in. The grant will help them add a lifestyle medicine course, according to Pendergrass. The residents are getting training now to help with coaching patients with both prevention and treatment for conditions like diabetes, according to Crum.

“We want to be able to work directly within these clinics that serve the communities right there,” Crum said. “Where we basically meet their needs and if we can help find physicians that have a heart to serve in these rural communities in East Texas, it really does make a big impact over time.”