Expanding Bangor residency program hopes to fill shortage of nurse practitioners
Penobscot Community Health Care will use a $2 million grant to expand its nurse practitioner residency program designed to train Maine’s future health care workers.
PCHC provides health care services to about 58,000 patients in Maine, with roughly 70 percent being low-income people and seniors, according to its website. In 2020, it launched its Nurse Practitioner Residency Program, which provides new practitioners with mentorship and a year of experience before entering the medical field as a provider.
Residents are in their first post-graduate year after nurse practitioner school. Twelve have graduated from the residency since it began, and six are working for PCHC, said Candace Davis, executive clinical director of advanced primary care.
By having Maine’s only residency program for family nurse practitioners, PCHC hopes to make a dent in the shortage of health care workers. Last month, PCHC temporarily halted walk-in care at four clinics on Saturdays due to staffing shortages. It also ceased walk-in services at its Union Street clinic entirely.
The idea is to attract residents to Greater Bangor so they will want to work at one of the nonprofit’s centers after completing the program, though it is not a requirement, Davis said.
“The residents are providing valuable access to patients in the Bangor area,” Davis said. “The relationships that they’re making this year can only increase their value as employed providers later on.”
Maine is projected to have a shortage of 1,450 registered nurses in 2025, according to a report commissioned by the Maine Nursing Action Coalition and Maine Hospital Association and released last year. While this is an improvement compared with a shortfall of 2,250 nurses in 2021, it is still a problem that the state is working to solve.
The $2.17 million federal grant that PCHC received from the Health Resources and Services Administration is specific to nurse practitioners and differentiates the residency program from others in Maine, Davis said. She hopes to expand the model to physician assistants down the line.
While registered nurses and nurse practitioners both observe patients, practitioners are permitted to diagnose them, prescribe treatments and order tests.
The funds will expand educational offerings for residents as well as launch a pilot that allows a recent graduate to return for a second year and build leadership skills.
“Residents are improving their skills by working in primary care and walk-in care,” Davis said. “They’re also working with the second-year resident as a leader of the cohort. So, that person is part of their development.”
The grant also covers residents’ salaries, training and a partnership with the University of Maine, which works with PCHC to develop curriculum.
The most recent cohort of four residents began in July and has already worked with more than 500 patients, Davis said. The residents, who are licensed to practice, have expressed interest in returning for a second year, she said, and the pilot will be evaluated to see if it can continue beyond this year.
Residents typically start by working with seven patients per day, which gradually increases to 14 per day by the end of the program. This gives them a realistic idea of how many patients they would see as employed providers, Davis said.
During the program, they rotate through specialities including women’s health, procedures and walk-in care. They also spend a week in the Somerset County town of Jackman, where PCHC has a community health center, to dive into rural medicine. They work with patients four days a week and train on Tuesdays.
By the end of the year, residents will provide care to more than 12,000 patients, Davis said.
“A lot of times, the residents come here not expecting to love Bangor and stay on,” she said. “But some do. One was from Georgia and she ended up staying on with PCHC.”