Grant to help fund creation of Physicians’ Resource Center

Montpelier, Vt. (September 27, 2011) – The Vermont Medical Society Education and Research Foundation (VMSERF) announced today that it has been awarded a $130,000 grant from The Physicians Foundation to help fund the creation of a statewide Physicians’ Resource Center.

The Center was proposed last June by VMSERF, a foundation committed to advancing public health through evaluation, education and improvement in the delivery of care, after its 2011 Physicians Needs Assessment suggested that Vermont’s doctors face increasing time and financial pressures that threaten to jeopardize care quality in the state. The Center will build physicians’ leadership skills to assist with solving problems that directly interfere with everyday processes of care, particularly time-consuming problems that could be redirected towards ensuring individualized, timely quality care.
“Successful healthcare reform will require the active involvement of Vermont physician leaders at all levels of care,” said Paula Duncan, M.D., president of the Vermont Medical Society. “This critical grant from The Physicians Foundation allows us to get started right away on this important work.”

A goal shared by both VMSERF and The Physicians Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to advancing the work of practicing physicians and improving the quality of healthcare for all Americans, is that the lessons learned and solutions created by the Center will serve as a national model that helps physicians facing similar issues across the country.
“The Center will not only assist Vermont physicians in overcoming the challenges they face on a day-to-day basis, but will also allow them to build new knowledge about critical and emerging issues,” said Alan Plummer, M.D., vice president of The Physicians Foundation and chair of the Grants Committee. “Most importantly, it will arm physicians with the resources they need to offer the best care possible for their patients.”

Considered a “core capacity-building grant,” the award by The Physicians Foundation aims to help VMSERF get the Center up and running, while leaving the door open for future support from the organization.

“The Foundation saw the Physicians’ Resource Center as such a needed resource and wanted to make sure that we had the funding to get it started,” said VMSERF President John Brumsted, M.D.”

About the Vermont Medical Society Education and Research Foundation
The Vermont Medical Society Education and Research Foundation, Inc. is a not-for-profit public benefit corporation organized exclusively for charitable, educational and scientific purposes. The mission of the Foundation is to advance the public good by supporting evaluation, education and improvement in the field of health. The Vermont Medical Society created the Foundation as a distinct entity with its own governance structure in order to separate its traditional advocacy role from the Foundation’s goal of promoting the health of all Vermonters through physician leadership, professionalism and shared decision making. For more information, visit www.VTMD.org.