With the first student enrolled in the joint administrative fellowship — launched by the School of Management and Yale-New Haven Hospital in 2013 — preparing to graduate, administrators are now looking to admit a new, expanded group of students to the program.
The administrative fellowships are open to doctors two years after finishing their medical residencies, as is the case with most medical fellowships at hospitals around the country. However, during the administrative fellowships, students not only complete medical clinical work but also earn an EMBA from the SOM. Though the program first started for the Radiology Department, it has now expanded to the OB/GYN and Emergency Medicine Departments. SOM and School of Medicine professor Howard Forman, who runs the SOM’s healthcare curriculum and is active in the administrative fellowship curriculum, said that over the last three years, three students have been admitted to the program who specialize in radiology. There will also be an additional student matriculating in the fall.
“The combination of these experiences will position them to go right in rather than wait 10 to 15 years to mature into a leadership role,” he said. “We have people who are cognizant of this and this is what they want to do earlier on in their career and are able to get this type of program and experience.”
He also said there was one student who just completed their first year in emergency medicine, and there is one student planning to matriculate this summer into the program who completed a residency in OB/GYN. Forman said the thinking behind instating the program is to allow students interested in healthcare leadership to expedite their careers.
SOM Associate Dean David Bach said the opportunity to work towards a business degree while on their fellowship — which commonly comes after residency in a doctor’s career — allows degree candidates to focus their medical educations on healthcare leadership and hospital management.
Forman said he hopes the program will be successful in ultimately using Yale talent to enhance Yale facilities, and he hopes graduates of the program will join current professionals and clinicians at Yale-New Haven Hospital who received Yale educations.
Michael Rolen SOM ’16 said he chose to enroll in the fellowship program in radiology because after his residency he decided he wanted to get more involved in the administrative aspect of his department. He said that if he were ever able to become chair of a department, he would want to have a solid financial background.
Kito Lord SOM ’16, who is the fellowship’s inaugural candidate in emergency medicine, said he was drawn to the fellowship because he feels that oftentimes cost-benefit analysis of patient care is not adequately considered. He said he felt that approaching patient care from a business perspective would illuminate how hospitals could run more efficiently and care for patients better.
“Money is taboo to talk about in medicine,” he said. “I really want to improve the doctor-patient relationship and a large part of it is business and how cost-effective things are.”
He said the classes he has been taking at the SOM, which cover topics such as problem framing, marketing and spread sheet modeling, have been largely effective in helping him gain the knowledge base he hoped for in enrolling in the program. However, he said it has been very challenging to simultaneously do clinical work at Yale-New Haven Hospital while also taking classes.
The SOM offers three tracks for the EMBA degree: healthcare, sustainability and asset management.