The future of medical schools and teaching hospitals in the era of managed care

Abstract

At the 125 U.S. medical schools and their affiliated teaching hospitals, most of the nation's basic and clinical research advances are made, and these translate into topflight medical care and great reductions in health care costs (e.g., $30 billion a year for polio). But these medical schools and teaching hospitals and their capacities to provide critical education and research are threatened by escalating erosion of their infrastructure, the declining academic workforce, the diminishing of quality and access as a result of growing marketplace forces, and shrinking funds. The author provides details about the forces threatening academic medical centers (i.e., medical schools and their affiliated teaching hospitals) and then presents a variety of strategies that individual academic medical centers can carry out to more efficiently use their resources. But sufficient resources ae still needed if centers are to function as they should. What is to save them? The author indicates that centers should not overly depend on managed care, the pharmaceutical industry, or foundations to provide the necessary support, and that centers' internal strategies can go only so far. He proposes that the importance of centers and the dangers they face must be communicated convincingly to the nation's citizens, business leaders, government representatives, and purchasers of health care. The message must be repeated frequently so it will sink in, and must be given in terms that are relevant to individuals and their families. He also advises that certain types of partnerships may be helpful. But most critical is the need to persuade the government to mandate separate revenue streams for research, education, and care for the underserved. As hard as this will be to achieve, there are many allies of academic medicine, from the president to numerous legislators; the author discusses what they have said and done to help. He concludes by urging everyone in academic medicine to do their parts to make a powerful case for the value of academic medical centers to society, and affirms his belief that American society will sustain these centers.