Changes in Health Administration at SJC

As you may know, there have been a number of changes here at Saint Joseph's College of Maine recently.

Dr. Joseph Lee has accepted the position of President of the college and will be inaugurated later this month. We look forward to working with Dr. Lee!

In the Health Administration programs we continue to work to ensure the quality of our programs. We are particularly excited about some new developments with our Master of Health Administration program. We are planning to develop a specialization in Catholic healthcare leadership, recognizing that many Catholic health organizations are working to strengthen their Catholic foundation. We have also applied for membership to the US Catholic Health Association. We're very excited about the opportunities this affords us to combine our expertise in equipping and supporting healthcare leaders with our Catholic heritage, to meet the needs of the profession.

We are already making plans for summer 2009 and intend to offer a greater variety of hybrid courses, as well as hosting another symposium. The symposium was very popular this past summer and we anticipate it will be even better next year! If you have ideas for topics for this event, please comment to this post. We would love to hear from you!

We will let you know as we progress!

SJC Health Administration Symposium 2008

The Graduate and Professional Studies division of Saint Joseph’s College of Maine held its first annual symposium for health administration professionals July 15th through 19th this year. The focus of the symposium was “Managing the Business of Healthcare.” The event was unique in that it was designed for both students wishing to gain academic credit (undergraduate and graduate) and others who attended the sessions for continuing education credit.

This exciting event brought together a national panel of experts to discuss a variety of subjects relevant to the success of healthcare organizations. Specific topics included ethics and advocacy, improving physician/hospital relations, the challenges of developing and maintaining interdisciplinary teams, an analysis of changing trends in health care, and more – a total of ten sessions.

Thirty individuals participated in the symposium in addition to the presenters. The participants were very active and each session was vibrant with exchanges of ideas and experiences! While there was general acknowledgement that the larger national health system issues could not be solved in that venue, there was a great deal of energy around initiating improvements in each person’s scope of influence, resulting in benefits to the larger system.

Michelle Sinclair’s comments reflected that of many of the participants when she stated, “overall I thought the entire program was excellent. It was an opportunity to network with people from all over country and from different disciplines as well as the instructors and the experts in their fields. I feel much more informed as to the latest trends and issues affecting healthcare and I know we just reached the tip of the iceberg. The seminar left me wanting more! Thank you to all of you who organized, coordinated, developed and presented the symposium. I'm looking forward to next year.”

The college plans to host this event annually and will engage experts on a variety of current topics each year. The symposium is open to all individuals working with or interested in healthcare. Most participants stayed on campus and enjoyed dining in the café, networking with others and participating in other on-campus events during their stay.