The Appalachian Regional Commission’s recently released RFP “Program Evaluation of the Appalachian Regional Commission’s Health Projects” seeks proposals from researchers and consultants. The program evaluation will examine roughly 230 projects located throughout all 13 Appalachian states funded from FY 2004 to FY 2010 for $30 million.
The program evaluation will include a range of health-related projects in areas including primary care, dental care, workforce, health planning, research, community facilities, health education, telemedicine, and mental health.
ARC is increasingly funding health-related projects in Appalachia but has not commissioned an evaluation of health projects in recent years. The primary goal is to evaluate the performance of ARC health investments from FY 2004 through FY 2010, using contractor-gathered data on project-specific performance measures.
This evaluation will help to enhance and standardize performance measures for ARC health projects and also help ARC more effectively develop, assess, manage health projects and investments, which will help the agency to document and report on the impact of programs.
ARC’s healthcare projects generally fall into three categories:
· Clinical Services—Activities that support clinical services for underserved populations, populations located in HPSAs or populations experiencing documented health disparities. Usually these are short term programs to support start-up operations, provide gap funding, or address clinical emergencies. Care provided can include primary care and specialty care. Patient services are usually provided in primary care facilities through telemedicine or in specialty clinics
· Healthcare Access—Activities that improve access to healthcare for underserved populations, especially populations located in HPSAs or experiencing health disparities. Specific activities to be evaluated can include equipment purchases, facilities upgrades or construction, developing telemedicine facilities or providing equipment, and how effectively workforce development efforts have been undertaken
· Health Promotion and Disease Preventions—Interventions are commonly community-based efforts to change unhealthy behaviors, to promote new policies or services, or to address specific disease conditions of local concern
The RFP’s Scope of Work includes developing and implementing data collection methods to obtain updated, accurate project performance data for ARC health projects. Also, the contractor must have the ability to prepare a database with project information along with key performance data to be uploaded to a web site for viewing by the public.
Go to www.arc.gov/images/grantsandfunding/contracts/HealthProjectsEvaluationRFPAugust 2012.pdf to view the RFP. Proposals are due September 6, 2012. For additional information on ARC’s health projects, go to www.arc.gov/health. For questions, email Kostas Skordas at kskordas@arc.gov.
