Healthcare jobs are projected to soar in the coming years, and it isn’t just for doctors, nurses and other care providers.
Administrative jobs are expected to rise, and a few new health administrative programs starting this school year at Central Massachusetts colleges are helping to meet the demand.
Fitchburg State University has added an online MBA program in health administration, and Anna Maria College in Paxton has begun a health administration undergraduate degree program.
It’s no mystery why: Health administration jobs have been projected by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics to grow 20% from 2016 to 2026. That rate would add 72,000 jobs nationwide, and it’s an even higher than the projected growth rate for registered nurses, whose number is estimated to rise 15% in that time.
In Massachusetts, the median salary last year for a health administrator was $133,900, the third highest in the country and far surpassing the already-high national median of just under $100,000, according to the BLS. With more than 15,000 health administrators in Massachusetts, the state has the highest concentration of such workers in the country.
Health administrators will be needed to coordinate services or manage a medical practice or hospital unit, and programs like those at Anna Maria and Fitchburg State will help prepare students to know both business basics and the ins-and-outs of the medical field. Both schools said they looked at market research and saw a growing demand.
Switching majors
Anna Maria added a new health administration major this fall along with two others, digital and social media design, and video and photographic arts.
Anna Maria cited an expected rise in demand for health jobs as the baby boomer population ages, requiring more care services. Graduates in the new bachelor’s program will learn theoretical business foundations, as well as health-specific skills including medical terminåology and metrics used to analyze financial and quality performance expectations of a health services organization.
Some students switched into the new major as soon as the college announced it, said Liz Manos, Anna Maria’s director of business programs and an associate professor. The school had noticed a higher than expected number of students switching from nursing majors into business.
“We thought they have an edge because they have more of a background [in health] than someone just in business,” Manos said.
The new major will make that broader knowledge of health and business not just a coincidental advantage but a built-in one. Students weren’t able to combine nursing and business degrees as dual majors before because of the course requirements from those areas.
Anna Maria has long had an MBA with concentrations in healthcare administration and health informatics, giving the school an indication of how popular the focus was with students. Those programs have attracted students from both medical and business backgrounds looking to advance up the chain of command, Manos said.
“Students are choosing paths that are nontraditional,” she said.
An easy decision
Fitchburg State – which already has MBA concentrations in management, accounting and human resources management – saw an immediate response upon adding health administration, said Beverley Hollingsworth, the school’s MBA program chair.
“Within a day, I must have gotten 35 responses from people who wanted to jump on board,” Hollingsworth said.
Some include students looking to switch from a management MBA track, she said.
The new healthcare MBA program includes courses on healthcare marketing, finances, and legal, ethnic and policy issues. Students will take more general business courses like other MBA students do, such as accounting and management.
Fitchburg State designed the online program to accommodate those already working in the field. A course can be completed in seven weeks, and the entire program in as short as 12 months.
The new program begins next spring and will have multiple start dates each year. Tuition will be $12,510, with no requirements for a graduate management admission test or graduate record examination.
Health administration concentrations have been added at other MBA programs in Massachusetts too, with similar programs available at Boston University, Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Fitchburg State joined them after the results of a market study made it an easy decision.
“Our department had been looking at it for awhile,” Hollingsworth said.
