Values

These are the values that we feel are very important to integrate into our work whether it is clinical practice, community service, teaching, or research.

• Diversity. We will work to ensure that the health care workforce reflects the diversity of the communities they serve.
• Cultural Competence. We will work to train the health care workforce so individual providers can accurately assess and integrate cultural beliefs and values within a therapeutic plan for their patients. In our community service, we will similarly act in such a way that our interventions are respectful of cultural beliefs and values.
• Community Responsiveness. Our work will center on the needs of the communities we serve including producing more primary care physicians to work in underserved rural and urban areas and producing primary care physicians and other health care professionals who are trained to reduce health disparities and access barriers to care.
• Preventively Oriented. We will focus our work on preventive interventions which reduce the burden of disease and disability, whether in our community service or within our clinical practices.
• Psychosocially Oriented. The health of individuals in communities is profoundly affected by their environment, including the web of relationships that surrounds each individual and exists in every community. Individual beliefs and values, personality, and mental health are also important indicators of health. In assessing and intervening in a health problem either in an individual or a community, we will take into account these psychosocial issues when planning an intervention.
• Evidence-Based and Academically Rigorous. We will take a thoughtful, scientific approach to the assessment of individual and community health problems and the design of individual and community interventions. Our research work will be of the highest quality scientifically. "Getting the word out" through publications and presentations is an important part of our effort to improve individual and community health.
• Innovative. As an academically oriented department, we will play a leadership role in the community, not only to research the causes of adverse health outcomes, but the interventions that might restore health to our individual patients and the community. We believe this innovative work should occur in collaboration with the community and other interested academic partners.
• Outcome Oriented. We will not only focus on the processes we implement to improve health, but the associated outcome. Linking our processes with community health outcomes will help us continuously improve our work.

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