New course focuses on business of medicine

Southwest Missouri State University and the Medical Group Management Association have teamed up to provide a special course of study for doctors and administrators.

The 14-month course will prepare them to run the business side of medical practice both in hospitals and private practice, according to Virginia Mee, director of the Management Development Institute at SMSU.

"The program is designed to help them with the changing organizational structure they now have to operate in," Mee said.

Dialogue has been going on for the last year between SMSU and the Greene County Medical Society to determine what might be needed in the curriculum. Since doctors are specifically trained in the practice of medicine, many of the complexities of operating a clinic, such as accounting and marketing, have not been part of their education and training.

In addition, hospitals have been asking doctors to become active in the formulation of policy, Mee said. In order to make decisions within the system, they need this knowledge of how things work from a business perspective, she said.

In August 1999, leaders in the College of Business Administration at SMSU went to the Medical Group Management Association national headquarters in Denver, Colo., to lay the groundwork for the program, said Mike Fields, associate dean of the College of Business Administration.

The MED series (Management, Education and Development), hosted by SMSU, was developed about 12 years ago. Each segment of the program is taught by top experts from around the country. Some customization was done for the SMSU program, based on the needs study conducted by the school and the Greene County Medical Society.

The first set of MED courses kicked off Jan. 21 with a visit from Dr. William Jessee, president and CEO of MGMA. Classes began that day for a group of about 30 physicians and administrators from St. John's Health System.

The first session gave participants insights to the changes in the medical field throughout the United States and an overview of the business of medicine today, said Mike Peters, director of community relations at St. John's. Peters is one of the participants in the course.

He said the SMSU College of Business Administration has added an extra benefit to the program by waving 25 hours of prerequisites for administrators who complete the program and want to go on for their master's degrees in business administration. Doctors completing the course will also be allowed to apply the credits toward their annual continuing education requirements.

The 14-month program begins with a basic overview and concentrates on areas of finance, accounting, planning and marketing, leadership, operation management and legal issues. Classes meet monthly on Friday and Saturday with five-hour sessions held each day.

The St. John's classes that started in January will overlap the new spring program slated to begin April 14.

The $5,950 fee includes all instruction, books and materials. Detailed information about the course can be obtained by contacting the SMSU College of Business Administration.

The Medical Group Management Association was organized in 1926 by the Carle, Mayo and Dean clinics to provide educational support for people involved on the management side of group medical practice, according to Drew Di Giovonni, assistant director at the Center for Education, MGMA.

The association took the MGMA name in the 1940s and it still focused primarily on administrative staff at that time. There were few physicians involved.

It wasn't until the late 1990s that doctors joined the association in great numbers, Di Giovonni said.

"As economic pressures get tighter and things change rapidly, it is important for physicians and administrators to work together," he said.