Teaching Hospitals & Academic Health Systems

Leading and innovating clinical care, medical education, and discovery.

Teaching Hospitals & Academic Health Systems

Teaching hospitals and academic health systems play a critical role in defining the future of healthcare. They train new generations of medical professionals, drive innovation and discovery, and provide specialized clinical care to those with rare or hard-to-treat illnesses. The communities they serve are diverse and often include economically vulnerable populations.

The challenges that teaching hospitals and academic health systems face in fulfilling this role are complicated. Working with an experienced partner can help these institutions thrive as market leaders.

Our Services Include:
Academic / Community Physician Alignment

AMCs are growing their complement of clinically focused “community physicians” at record rates. Having the right physician alignment strategy and an appropriately structured physician enterprise can propel growth, enhance care, and support the sustainability of the AMC.

  • Physician strategy
  • Affiliations, partnerships, and nonemployed alignment models
  • Hybrid academic/community physician groups
  • Physician network development

As competition from nonacademic health systems continues to intensify, academic health systems must evaluate their organizational, governance, and leadership structures to ensure they are streamlined, efficient, and capable of effectively driving performance.

  • Academic health system governance
  • Organizational design and restructuring of component entities
  • Leadership and management structures
  • Oversight models for related/affiliated entities

The inter- and intra-entity financial arrangements at many AMCs are not effective in aligning payment levels with service expectations and institutional objectives, leading many to reexamine and redesign their funds flow framework and methodologies.

  • Funding for clinical effort that balances production, coverage, and quality
  • Resource allocation models for UME, GME, and other educational programs
  • Institutional investment in research effort and cores
  • Mission support arrangements linked to financial and operational metrics

Establishing new residency programs is a significant undertaking that requires organizations to optimize GME Medicare reimbursement, address accreditation-related challenges, and position the GME enterprise for long-term sustainability.

  • Medicare reimbursement optimization and cost benchmarking
  • New program feasibility and development
  • Continuity clinic performance improvement
  • Organization, governance, and multiparty GME models
  • GME portfolio planning/rebalancing
  • Accreditation assistance
  • As their fund flow models evolve, AMCs also seek a faculty compensation framework that supports the revised financial construct, promotes and rewards productivity, and appropriately recognizes the effort and contributions of faculty to the institution and its academic mission.

    • Compensation and effort standards
    • Benchmarking of compensation and production
    • Performance-based incentive models
    • Implementation strategies and planning

    High-performing faculty group practices require close integration among component departments, efficient management and operations, and aligned financial incentives.

    • Financial performance improvement
    • Practice infrastructure and operational efficiency
    • Inter- and intradepartmental finances and funds flow
    • Interim management

    A well-designed faculty group practice is an essential component of the academic health system. Developing and implementing contemporary FGP structures is critical to drive the clinical enterprise, align faculty incentives, and support the academic mission.

    • Faculty group practice organizational design and restructuring
    • Governance, management, and financial structure
    • Transition planning and implementation
    • Physician network development

    Research drives medicine forward through innovation, improved quality, advancements in technology, and cutting-edge practices, informing and transforming all of healthcare. At the same time, the funding environment continues to become more competitive, requiring organizations to explore a new path forward on their research investments.

    • Strategic planning and growth
    • Research administration enhancement
    • Research productivity and funds flow
    • Risk and regulatory
    • Research management systems

    Academic health systems and universities around the country are revisiting long-standing affiliations and contemplating new partnerships to position for the future. Modern partnerships must account for market dynamics, align each party’s strategic and financial interests, and provide flexibility to withstand the test of time and uncertainty.

    • Health system/university affiliation agreements
    • Mergers, acquisitions, and operating agreements for academic health systems
    • Joint ventures
    • Postmerger integration
    • Service line/programmatic partnerships (e.g., cancer, cardiovascular)
    • Physician alignment strategies (academic and community): group design, networks, PSAs

      Close alignment between primary teaching hospitals and physicians, either through functional or structural integration, drives performance and is critical to the success of academic health systems.

      • Integrated academic health system development
      • Contemporary “functional” structures that promote financial and strategic alignment
      • Faculty group practice design and implementation
      Teaching Hospitals & Academic Health Systems

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