DNP Student Selected for National Medical Fellowships Primary Care Leadership Program

Libertone will receive a $5,000 stipend to cover expenses during this service-learning experience period.

Program scholars engage with a community health center (CHC) partner and Primary Care Leadership Program (PCPL) mentors in leadership training, team-based project activities and health care service delivery. 2021 site partners are located in Boston, Mass.; Gateway Cities, Mass.; Chicago, Ill.; Houston, Texas; Los Angeles, Calif.; Miami, Fla.; and Oakland, Calif.

2021 programming in Boston focuses on substance use disorders, behavioral health integration and combatting the opioid crisis.

“The nurse practitioner role is constantly evolving, and this [program] is helping to broaden my experience, both as a provider and a leader in the primary care setting,” says Libertone. “Nurse practitioners are essential to providing care to diverse and underserved communities as we are able to fill the gap between the barriers to access affordable, comprehensive health care services and the patient populations that are experiencing increasingly complex diseases who often go undiagnosed and untreated.”

Libertone is the first UB School of Nursing student to be selected for this program. Her post-graduation plan is to work in a community health setting as a primary care provider who incorporates substance abuse treatment into practice. Libertone’s efforts will be geared toward increasing accessibility to quality, comprehensive care in low-income families and underserved communities.

The GE Foundation and National Medical Fellowships founded the Primary Care Leadership Program in 2012 to increase access to primary care for the underserved. PCLP provides future health care professionals with an opportunity to experience the challenges and rewards of primary care practice in community health centers (CHCs) across the U.S. The program is open to medical students and graduate-level nursing and physician assistant students who are poised to become leaders in primary care.

To learn more about this program, please visit the NMF Primary Care Leadership Program webpage.