As Central Valley communities have been designated health professional shortage areas (HPSA) by the federal government, clinics continue to struggle to find entry-level workers or allied health proffesionals that are both linguistically and culturally competent to serve the growing needs of rural communities. Regionally, the Central Valley experiences greater shortages of primary care physicans, specialty physicians, and totally physicians than any other region in the state of California. A growing ethnically and culturally diverse population in the Central Valley requires mobilized efforts to shed light on growing vacancies among the health care professions. In an effort to capture vulnerable youth who are needed to minimize and mitigate the health care workforce disparities, which ultimately impacts health care access, quality and outcomes in Central Valley communities.
CVHN hosts an annual youth conference to provide high school students the opportunity to explore career options from a series of areas in healthcare such as Medical, Behavioral Health, Dental, Ancillary Services and Healthcare Administration in hope to cultivate or strengthen a desire to prepare for a career within the healthcare community to advocate for best practices in patient care.
Conferences have been planned to engage students in the following counties:
Freno County
Kern County
Madera County
Merced County
Sacramento County
San Joaquin County