Reflecting on Progress A Report

Office of the Senior Vice President  for Health Sciences  Frank B. Cerra, Sr. Vice President October 19, 2000

Academic Health Center Academic Achievements
 

Education

• Providing increased administrative support for interscholastic education and greater faculty and community involvement.  Hiring an assistant vice president for education to lead the AHC’s interscholastic educational efforts, creating a community advisory board to provide assistance and advice, and creating an educational leaders forum of AHC associate deans of education and curriculum heads to coordinate and oversee the efforts.

 
• Creating an investment pool and grant program to fund development of interscholastic educational initiatives.  Have awarded $2.2 million since 1998 to eight faculty teams to develop intercollegiate initiatives in primary care, managed care, neurosciences, adolescent care, geriatrics, and the care of the aging, in integrating the teaching of evidence-based skills into the curriculum and in developing web-enhanced learning modules.

 
• Beginning development of a new model of health professional education that is more interdisciplinary and community based, teaches a broader set of skills and knowledge needed by practitioners, and better utilizes information technology.

 
• Seeding the development of new interscholastic degree options:  Minor in Complementary Care, Minor in Bioethics, Masters in Clinical Trial Research, and joint degrees with the Law School.

 
• Working to increase funding of health professional education:

• Bringing the issue onto the Minnesota public policy agenda as a priority for community leaders and elected officials.
• Engaging the health systems, insurance companies, and public officials in developing a new model for funding health professional education in Minnesota.
• Securing $8 million in recurring state funding from a tobacco endowment to support health professional education at the University.
• Working with state officials and health systems to provide funding for the clinical training of medical, pharmacy, dental and advanced practice nursing students and residents through MERC, the state trust fund for medical education and research.
• Advocating for greater public investment in health professional education nationally by leading national policy and political efforts through AAMC and AAHC, and helping organize Project Medical Education, a national coalition of academic health centers and medical schools to lobby for Medicare reform.

• Sustaining the quality of educational programs:

• Providing support to the Medical School and School of Medicine, Duluth to meet accreditation standards and to implement unitary accreditation.  Providing $750,000 in the last two years.
• Restructuring the allied health sciences (physical therapy, occupational therapy, medical technology, and mortuary science) to sustain the quality of their academic programs and their top national rankings.   Providing $300,000 annually since 1998 to help support the allied health science programs.

• Strengthening the educational affiliations we have with more than 200 organizations in Minnesota for the clinical/experiential education and training of our students and residents.  Developing master agreements that cover multiple schools; strengthening quality standards and oversight; and revamping the experiential training programs to better reflect changing professional requirements.

 
• Investing in the development of community-based educational programs:

• Providing for expansion of community-based clinical training/experiential programs in Pharmacy, Nursing, Dentistry, and the School of Medicine, Duluth.   Allocating $1.6 million over the last two years.
• Creating the Rural Health School, led by the School of Medicine, Duluth, to provide clinical/experiential training of intercollegiate teams of students in rural communities.  Allocating $600,000 annually for the school.

• Developing plans to increase enrollments to meet the growing shortage of health professionals in Minnesota and nationally.  Plans have been developed for increasing enrollments in pharmacy, nursing, medical technology, and rural dentistry in the next two years, depending on legislative funding.

 
• Investing $4,500,000 over the last four years to refurbish classrooms, build and equip student computer labs, improve computer technology in classrooms, and refurbish and add more student study space.   Beginning program planning for a new AHC educational and learning center.

 
• Strengthening student support services through increased activities at CHIP, the AHC student activities unit.  Increasing student participation in CHIP sponsored events, workshops, seminars, conferences, and retreats.  Over 200 students serve on various CHIP councils and committees and over 2500 students attend CHIP sponsored events annually.   Renovating the CHIP student lounge to provide better study and meeting space and expanding hours to provide greater access for students.  Developing volunteer projects to assist in community-based learning for AHC students, including health education talks and clinical services for the homeless.

Research

• Providing increased administrative support for interscholastic research and greater faculty and community involvement.  Hiring an assistant vice president for research to lead the AHC’s interscholastic research efforts, creating a community advisory board to provide assistance and advice, and creating a council of AHC associate research deans to coordinate and oversee efforts.

 
• Fostering interdisciplinary research.  Creating an investment pool and grant program to fund intercollegiate research projects.  Have awarded $4.8 million since 1998 to 22 intercollegiate faculty research teams.  Projects must be intercollegiate, interdisciplinary, innovative, and have a high potential for on-going funding from external sources.  Maximum awards are $300,000.

 
• Investing in areas of emerging faculty research interest:
• Working with the Provost to define and promote the effort in genomics, functional genomics, bioinformatics and stem cell development.
• Establishing a Biomedical Genomics Center, investing $1.5 million for start up of  the center.  AHC Deans have committed to hiring 25 new faculty in this area over the next two to three years.
• Establishing a Center for Bioinformatics, investing $1 million over the past three years in development of the center.
• Investing $550,000 to preserve and strengthen the Health Services Research and Policy Institute in the School of Public Health.
• Creating the National Institute for Health Policy in collaboration with the University of St. Thomas.  Investing $450,000 over three years.
• Creating a Center for Cellular and Molecular Therapy, investing $125,000 in the center’s development
• Strengthening the Biomedical Engineering Institute, providing $300,000.
• Establishing the Center for Spirituality and Healing, a national leader in complementary and alternative health.  Investing $350,000 annually in its development for the past three years.  The center has raised $2 million in private gifts and has just received a $1.6 million NIH grant.

• Securing comprehensive status for the Cancer Center from the National Cancer Institute.

 
• Recruiting, retaining, and developing top ranked research faculty:

• Providing $1.2 million over the past four years to assist schools in faculty recruitments and retentions.
• Creating a faculty research seed grant program to enable faculty to expand into new areas of research.  $250,000 is awarded annually to individual investigators.  Maximum grants is $25,000.   Have awarded $750,000 since FY 1999.
• Increasing the number of endowed chairs.

• Expanding privately funded research by establishing a Research Services Office in 1997 to facilitate interface between AHC faculty and industry; expedite the development, processing and administrative/regulatory review of proposals; and support the conduct of clinical studies.    The office has reduced the processing time from 171 to 57 days.  Since January 1998, it has assisted in the review of 231 clinical trial proposals.  By the end of 1999, it had supported 107 clinical trials at as estimated contract value of $8.1 million.  An additional 15 projects are in the final initiation stages and have an estimated contract value of $2.6 million.

 
• Enhancing technology transfer by:
• Defining and supporting the AHC translational pipeline.
• Working with state government to develop a proposal to enhance biomedical innovation and commercialization.
• Building and sustaining a strong research program at Fairview University Medical Center by:

• Chairing the education and research committee of the Fairview board, integrating research into the Fairview mission, developing a strategic research plan, and advocating for allocation of adequate funds to support research .
• Facilitating the conduct of research at FUMC.
• Investing $2 million annually for joint University-Fairview initiatives.

• Improving research facilities, including:

• Completing the Basic Sciences and Biomedical Engineering Building:  $68 million; 230,000 square feet.
• Remodeling Jackson Hall:  $25 million; 68,000 square feet.
• Building the world’s leading basic and applied research facility for magnetic resonance imaging:  $8 million; 35,000 square feet.
• Renovating the Molecular and Cellular Therapeutics facility to provide a state of the art GMP facility:  $3.5 million
• Beginning construction of the Molecular and Cellular Biology Building:  $78 million; 240,000 square feet.
• Designing and building facilities to encourage interdisciplinary collaboration.  Faculty are assigned office and laboratory space based on common research interests rather than their college or department.
• Strengthening the Research Animal Resources program:

• Expanding services to meet the growing demand from University researchers.  Remodeling facilities, and investing $300,000 to build a SPF mouse facility.

 
• Improving administrative efficiency and service.  Merging the College of Veterinary Medicine’s Animal Research Facilities unit into RAR.  Consolidating all of the university’s AAALAC accredited units (AHC/CVM/CLA, Duluth, Hormel) into one University of Minnesota accredited unit.  Developing a five-year financial plan to improve RAR’s financial management.  Developing a new information management system to integrate animal ordering, billing, and invoice payments.  The system will provide faster and more accurate billing and will enable investigators to order supplies and services from RAR electronically.

• Providing increased oversight to ensure compliance with regulatory requirements:

• In collaboration with the vice president for research, designing and implementing a new grants management system utilizing a faculty-administrative decision model.
• Providing executive leadership to the development of a work plan for NIH compliance to remove the University’s exceptional status designation.
• Implementing a clinical research compliance program under which clinical studies are randomly selected for review.
• Revamping and strengthening the conflict of interest review process in the AHC.  Developing a system for electronic submission of AREPA and ROC forms.
• Developing new controlled substances policy in collaboration with the vice president for research.
• Increasing training and technical assistance on regulatory compliance issues for researchers and research staff.

Clinical Enterprise
 

• Negotiating the sale of the hospital and clinics to Fairview Health Services, eliminating the University’s liability for hospital/clinical operating losses, and sustaining a top-quality facility for education of AHC students, research, and faculty clinical practice.

 
• Working to assure the success of the new affiliation with Fairview by
• creating a vision and strategic plan for the relationship.
• solving numerous financial, programmatic, and operational issues.
• improving facilities:  Psychiatry Department; Mind, Body, Spirit Clinic
• defining and implementing a cost accounting model to support education and research in the hospital ("The Bucket").
• creating a $2 million investment pool for new joint University-Fairview initiatives.
• opening a new primary care clinic in collaboration with UMP.
• developing and implementing a plan to increase market share for Fairview University Medical Center, and to meet our public mission to the other health provider systems in the state.
• conducting an external review to assess the effectiveness of the affiliation and ways to improve it.

• Merging 19 private practice plans into a single practice, University of Minnesota Physicians, which became operational on July 1, 1997.   Consolidating administrative operations; developing and implementing plan to increase market share; successfully competing for inclusion as a provider under the state health plan; improving performance so that the clinics are operating at community cost and quality benchmarks.

 
• Increasing patient care visits and revenues in the Dentistry and Veterinary Medicine clinical practices.   Developing plans to sustain the viability of these clinical practices in the changing health care marketplace.

 
• Strengthening the Community-University Health Care Center in the Phillips neighborhood of Minneapolis.  Strengthening the administrative and financial management of the center; working with the board and staff to develop three-year financial and programmatic plans to improve the financial viability of the center; providing $2.9 million over the last four years to cover operating costs at the clinic to sustain educational programs for AHC students and patient services during transition to a new financial plan; investing $233,000 in FY2000 to remodel the facility to improve patient care; and implementing plans to strengthen relationships with the Philips neighborhood.

• Development of the University operating and capital budgets
• Development, review, and oversight of AHC unit compacts
• Review and oversight of AHC promotion and tenure decisions
• Oversight of the Enterprise Project
• Development and oversight of University-wide academic programs including reorganization and strengthening of the biological sciences, and development of neuro-behavioral programs.

Joint Efforts with the Vice President for Research

• Increasing public and privately funded research
• Developing and implementing new models to strengthen the University’s technology transfer
• Designing, implementing, and overseeing a new grants management system
• Providing executive leadership to the development of a work plan for NIH compliance to remove the University’s exceptional status designation
• Implementing a clinical research compliance program
• Revamping and strengthening the conflict of interest review process
• Developing new controlled substances policy
• Increasing training and technical assistance on regulatory compliance issues for researchers and research staff.

Philanthropy

• Working with both the University of Minnesota Foundation (nursing, pharmacy, veterinary medicine, and dentistry) and the Minnesota Medical Foundation (medical school, Duluth, public health) to increase philanthropic support for AHC programs.

Governance

• Strengthening governance and internal communications to enhance decision making and  improve morale by
• Implementing collaborative decision making and governance systems
• Creating an AHC Deans Council
• Empowering deans to make decisions within schools and advise at the AHC level
• Improving the relationship with the AHC Faculty Consultative Committee and Faculty Assembly
• Working with faculty to create an effective Finance and Planning Committee
• Working with students to create an AHC Student Consultative Committee
• Increasing personal, written and electronic communications
• Using cross-functional teams to define and solve problems
• Recruiting outstanding faculty, department chairs, administrators and deans
• Creating an effective Council of Research Deans and a Educational Leaders Forum to guide interscholastic research and education, respectively.

Management

• Redesigning and implementing administrative processes in the areas of finance, information services, communications, facilities, human resources.  The various models provide for distributed decision-making with oversight and accountability.

 
• Implementing rigorous financial oversight systems and processes by
• Organizing a new annual all-funds budget development and allocation process
• Introducing a position management program
• Forming a strategic investment pool for funding new education and research initiatives
• Linking the annual budget process to long-range financial planning
• Linking programmatic decisions and needs to the planning and budget process
• Instituting a financial performance reporting system
• Designing new and adapting current financial management information systems
• Implementing an audit process that periodically audits all units and provides for follow up on the audit results, using the university audit function.

• Establishing a process that defines the programmatic aspects of space, marries it to the space needs, and prioritizes the various projects in the AHC.
• Investing in new facilities and remodeling of existing space, including completing the BSBE building, renovation of 10 classrooms, constructing a new Molecular and Cellular Biology building, renovating Jackson Hall, working with Fairview to upgrade clinical spaces, building a new Magnetic Resonance Imaging building to support research, remodeling student study space, and remodeling numerous research laboratories to recruit and retain faculty to remain competitive internationally.