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Community Apgar Project

The Community Apgar Project (CAP) is a research-validated questionnaire used to assist rural hospitals in North Dakota identify strengths and challenges related to recruiting and retaining various types of health workforce. Originally, the CAP process and methodology was utilized in North Dakota to look at what makes a community healthcare facility attractive to family medicine physicians. In recent years, the project evaluated what makes a community healthcare facility a good educational campus for health professions education through a tool called the Health Professions Education in Rural Communities (HPERC). Currently, the CAP project is evaluating CEO recruitment and retention factors in rural Critical Access Hospitals. The CEO Apgar is expected to be completed by summer of 2025.

The Community Apgar Project:

  • Is a train-the-trainer program which uses a validated research tool to gather data.
  • Allows Critical Access Hospitals to identify and prioritize factors important to recruiting and retaining various types of workforce, specific to their hospitals.
  • Provides data which can guide strategic planning and recruitment and retention efforts for Critical Access Hospitals (2010-2016).
  • Uses HPERC tool to provide data which can determine readiness for becoming an educational campus for health professions students (2019).
  • Studies factors related to recruiting and retaining CEOs to Critical Access Hospitals (2023-2025).

CAP was developed by the Family Medicine Residency of Idaho (now called Full Circle Health) and Boise State University. The Center for Rural Health partners with Boise State University to bring this project to North Dakota. The HPERC is being developed by the University of North Dakota School of Medicine & Health Sciences Department of Family & Community Medicine, the North Dakota Center for Rural Health, and the North Dakota Area Health Education Center.