The University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences College of Pharmacy, in collaboration with the Arkansas Center for Health Improvement established the ACHI-UAMS Graduate Research Health Policy Analysis Fellowship. These two entities work collaboratively to support a post-graduate Fellow to conduct and support health policy research in the state of Arkansas and nationally.
The Fellow shall also have access to the Arkansas Health Data Initiative (HDI), a data warehouse located at ACHI that contains integrated data sets from multiple sources including public insurance carriers, state government entities, student health data and other information.
The Fellow will be expected to assist ACHI investigators with health policy and health services research projects, policy briefs, and reports with an emphasis on using observational data resources such as the all payer claims data and the Arkansas Health Data Initiative. To be granted access to data housed at ACHI, the Fellow will be required to execute a confidentiality agreement and agree to abide by all ACHI security/privacy and publication protocols
Upon completion of the one year fellowship, the Fellow will be expected to have developed increased knowledge and skills by having obtained experience in the following areas:
Health Data Analytics
The Fellow will gain experience in management, organization, and analysis of observational data that can be used to support health policy evaluations, quality assessments / improvement, health services research, health economics, or policy relevant epidemiologic projects. The Fellow will develop skills in constructing analytic files from raw data files, gain an understanding of health care data structure and layout, and become more experience with utilizing software such as SAS.
Leadership, Project Management, and Interpersonal Skills
The Fellow will participate in multi-disciplinary teams while developing skills on leadership, project management, and interpersonal skills.
Dissemination
The Fellow will gain experience in disseminating findings through a variety of means including oral presentation, development of policy briefs and reports, public media, and scholarly journals.
Networking
Through interaction with various ACHI leaders and their partners, the Fellow will build networking skills and gain understanding of the varied and differing perspectives of broader healthcare issues. Such interaction will result in a better understanding of the skills and attributes required to be successful in developing actionable findings.