L. Gary Hart, Ph.D. has been named Director of the Rural Health Office (RHO) for The University of Arizona Mel and Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health.

As Director of the RHO, Dr. Hart will address Arizona’s current and projected population growth patterns that are generating a number of challenges impacting rural health care. These include increasing demands for health care professionals, new health care facilities, additional housing, transportation, and community infrastructure. These issues invariably extend to the tribal populations in the state, as well as to the populations located at the US-Mexico border area.

Hart earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the University of Utah and his doctorate in medical geography from the University of Washington. As a part of his Ph.D. work Hart completed a doctoral opportunities program from the University of Washington’s Department of Health Services.

In early July, just at the start of his first official summer in Tucson, Hart arrived with his wife Shelly, three year-old daughter, and two teenagers. He brings to the position three decades of experience in rural health at the University of Washington where he headed the Rural Health Research Center, serving the states of Washington, Wyoming, Alaska, Montana and Idaho (WWAMI). Hart also served as a Professor at the University of Washington’s Department of Family Medicine and was the Director of the University’s Center for Health Workforce Studies.

“One of my goals is to build the capacity of the Rural Health Office to impact the health of Arizona’s diverse populations, through policy analysis and programmatic interventions,” said Hart. He added that in order to accomplish this, “I need to learn more about the day-to-day issues and problems faced by the advocates, the research community, the health care providers, the health care reimbursement system, and most importantly, the people seeking health care.” Dr. Hart has published widely on rural health care, health workforce (e.g. nurses, physicians, oral health care professionals and the like), clinical practice variation, geographic definition methodology, and perinatal care issues. His various activities have geographically ranged from local communities to states, regions, the nation, and international. For instance, he directed a four year continuing education program (e.g. physicians, dentists, and nurses) to third-world jurisdictions in the far Pacific.

In 1995, Hart was awarded the National Rural Health Association’s Distinguished Researcher award. In addition, Hart is the co-creator of the now widely-used Rural-Urban Commuting Areas (RUCAs) that determine rurality, and are used as an important basis for determining eligibility for funding through a number of federal health programs. He was most recently appointed to serve on the Board of the Arizona Rural Health Association.