Demonstrating the way in which the National Diffusion Network (a system set up to disseminate exemplary educational practices) operates, this article describes application of an Illinois-developed early childhood program to the needs of a rurally isolated county in North Carolina. (JC)

Summarizes the 20-year history of the Appalachian Regional Commission's innovative, flexible, $550M model health care delivery system. Cites achievements in establishing primary care clinics; tackling black lung disease; and expanding health manpower, health education, maternal and child health care, and rehabilitation centers. (NEC)

Traces Southern West Virginia Regional Health Council's decade of delivering/linking cradle-to-grave health services for 500,000 rural residents. Describes microwave communications radio network; clinics; services in family planning, genetic counseling, prenatal care, maternal/child care, nutrition, heart/respiratory disease screening, renal…

An interstate consortium sponsors emergency medical training programs, purchases equipment, and arranges reciprocal certification in a 31-county area of Maryland, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia. (Author/JC)

Funded under Title III of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, the project's reading specialists take over a teacher's classroom in order that the teacher may visit a demonstration center where good teaching practices are demonstrated in classroom situations. (NQ)

Describes three state-initiated programs that address the challenge of providing access to health care for Appalachia's rural residents: a traveling pediatric diabetes clinic serving eastern Kentucky; a telemedicine program operated out of Knoxville, Tennessee; and a new medical school in Kentucky dedicated to training doctors from Appalachia for…

Ten-year-old WWVU-TV serves 45,000 K-12 students in a 29 county area of northern West Virginia. Also, during the current semester 1,167 students from West Virginia University are enrolled for college "telecourses". (BR)

Allied health professionals are those (exclusive of physicians, dentists, pharmacists, and nurses) who provide health care in support of or supplementing other health professionals. The Regional Technical Institute enables students from 26 colleges and junior colleges in Alabama and Tennessee to train in 14 allied health professions. (BR)