VCU news

By Cassie Williams Jones

In order to meet changing health care business needs, the Virginia Commonwealth University School of Business is partnering with the VCU School of Allied Health Professions and the VCU School of Medicine to offer new health-focused concentrations and a dual-degree program within three business graduate programs.

In a collaboration among the schools, graduates can now receive an Executive Master of Business Administration (MBA) degree with a concentration in health care management, a Master of Arts in Economics degree with a health economics specialization, or a dual degree with a Master of Health Administration (MHA) and a Master of Science in Information Systems (MSIS).

"The ever-changing political and social landscape of health care policy also affects the business of health care, which is a career path chosen by many of our students and alumni," said Ed Grier, dean of the School of Business. "We recognize the importance of the health care industry here at VCU, and we're focused on offering these kinds of cross-campus collaborations to better prepare future leaders."

The multidisciplinary approach to these health-enhanced program options provides opportunities to business students that they would not otherwise have in a traditional business graduate program.

“The most significant motivation for establishing these cross-disciplinary collaborations was to meet the needs of students and ensure their continued success,” said Cecil Drain, Ph.D., dean of the School of Allied Health Professions. “Changes in health care demand transformation in higher education and this type of collaboration is an example of how VCU is providing innovative health care education through our combined expertise and resources.”

The MBA with a health care management concentration, offered by the schools of Business and Allied Health Professions, encompasses a summer cohort concentrated on health-related coursework, with the first cohort beginning recently this summer semester. EMBA students within the concentration will tailor their international component, in which students travel abroad and work with an international organization, to a health-focused project.

Students from this program will be best suited to work in the non-care delivery market in health industries such as pharmaceuticals, suppliers, architecture, design, construction and biosciences commercialization. These graduates also will qualify for professions in human resources in large companies of all types.

The health economics concentration will be available beginning this fall. It is offered through an alliance among the School of Business’ Department of Economics, the School of Allied Health Professions’ Department of Health Administration and the School of Medicine’s Department of Healthcare Policy and Research .

“This partnership offers unique advantages to our students,” said Jerome Strauss III, M.D., Ph.D., dean of the School of Medicine. “They will have access to the expertise of health professionals and an esteemed academic research medical center, as well as a savvy business school with close connections to the global business world. This is a powerful combination.”

For many, the economics graduate program will serve as a funnel to doctoral work, such as the Healthcare Policy and Research Ph.D. program in the School of Medicine. Economics graduates will qualify for a wide range of analyst positions in the private or public sectors, particularly positions requiring both modeling skills and substantial experience in the analysis and interpretation of firm-level, industry or macroeconomic data.

The dual degree program, also beginning fall 2013, is a partnership between the School of Business’ Department of Information Systems and the School of Allied Health Professions’ Department of Health Administration. Graduates with the two degrees will most likely work in information technology within any health care vertical industry. Back-to-back, obtaining the two degrees would take five years, but this dual-degree program fits them both into three years.