FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
Question: Why Tulane HSM for the MHA degree? Answer: The health care industry is the nation's second largest employer and it is projected to grow to 20% of the United States' gross domestic product by 2016. The MHA program at Tulane University provides its students with the rigorous and specialized education they need to be effective health services leaders and managers. While the curriculum of a typical MBA program may offer elective courses specific to health care management, its core courses in finance, accounting, marketing, economics and organizational behavior typically do not provide sufficient depth or relevant applications to the health care industry to be the best value for students who aspire to become managers and future leaders of hospitals, government agencies, group practices, pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, health insurance organizations, HMOs, and consulting firms. In addition, an MHA degree program requires an administrative internship or residency in a health care setting to ground the student's academic experience in real world knowledge. In Tulane's Department of Health Systems Management, for example, the MHA finance curriculum focuses not only on for-profit organizations normally studied in an MBA degree program but also on non-profit organizations common in the hospital industry and public sector, and the special characteristics of third party payment, Medicare, Medicaid and non-profit access to capital. The MHA accounting courses provide not only standard accounting principles but offers additional instruction in the principles and concepts unique to the health care industry. The economics course applies economic concepts to the understanding of health care markets including government and private insurance, hospital care physician services, pharmaceuticals and long term care. The marketing course focuses on strategic and tactical marketing issues facing health systems, physicians and other providers, including patient retention, patient satisfaction, and health care marketing tactics. The MHA organizational theory and behavior courses deal with challenges of managing service organizations that are predominantly staffed by highly trained health care professionals. The department of Health Systems Management follows the Practitioner/Scholar Philosophy of teaching by maintaining a faculty who are nationally and internationally recognized in the health services field. This philosophy assures that the student is engaged in immediate and continuous interaction with health care administration practitioners' throughout the MHA program. |
