Newswise — When leaders at the University of Michigan Medical School want to measure the impact that one more National Institutes of Health grants will have on the institution, the answer can be found in seconds. When they want to compare how a department or faculty member compares to other departments or faculty members within the Medical School, they now are armed with an immediate way of finding that information.
The Medical School is in the forefront nationwide with its web-based system of tools that allow for quick data analyses and provide an opportunity for financial, space and faculty planning many years into the future. The tools, created at the Medical School, can be used to evaluate productivity of faculty members and departments, which can be critical when trying to forecast future research needs, such as when a new research building may be required.
While some corporations have conducted business this way for years, a rigorous business model like this is unprecedented among medical schools.
"We have made it possible for people to get the information they need to make sound business decisions, with just a few clicks of the mouse," says Dean Allen S. Lichter, M.D. "This allows us to use the most current information and to make solid projections about plans for the future."
The system comprises three parts: M-Stat, which makes available information about space allocations, faculty appointments and compensation, research submissions, expenditures and awards, clinical activity and more; M-Dash, an application that knits together the information from M-Stat and turns it into easy-to-understand and useful charts, graphs and projections; and M-Alert, a function still undergoing testing that will send e-mails to users when selected numbers fall above or below certain levels.
"The point of data collection at the Medical School is to provide the basis for intelligent business decisions," says Bill Elger, executive director for administration and chief financial officer of the Medical School. "This is a time when funding sources in the world of scientific research are increasingly uncertain. We need to be better stewards of our resources to help ensure we have resources to reinvest in growing the academic enterprise."
Other institutions would be wise to follow suit, says Jack Krakower, associate vice president, Division of Medical School Services & Studies at the Association of American Medical Colleges.
"I am a very strong fan of what the University of Michigan Medical School is doing. The system is easy to use and presents complex data in a friendly way," Krakower says. He notes that U-M and Loyola University in Chicago are far ahead of most institutions in these areas.
When Lichter and Elger presented their new approach at the recent annual meeting of the Association of American Medical Colleges, they were deluged with questions and compliments. Deans and administrators from other universities wanted to know how the Medical School did it, and how they could incorporate the same techniques at their institutions.
In the past, budgets were once-a-year exercises that, according to Elger, focused too much on immediate concerns rather than planning for the future and encouraged departments to use all the money budgeted for that year, regardless of actual need. That led to behaviors he says, designed to use up all the allotted money in order to justify future requests for funding at the same or higher levels.
And even though information about space utilization, research funding and other areas was available, it came in nearly impenetrable stacks of paper. Finding what was important, Elger says, was like searching for a needle in a haystack.
Using M-Stat and M-Dash, Elger and colleagues have moved toward a concept called "beyond budgeting," which looks several years down the road instead of relying on year-by-year budgeting. M-Stat and M-Dash helps with this process by allowing users to customize information and to perform "what-if" scenarios.
For instance, Lichter has a goal of increasing funding from the National Institutes of Health until the Medical School is fifth among universities receiving NIH grants. Graphs on M-Dash illustrate what would happen if the Medical School continues at its same rate, which is slightly lower than the NIH rate of increase: the school would drop from 11th to 13th place among medical schools receiving the most research dollars. But if the school were to grow at a rate of 2.5 times the average, and other institutions continued at their current growth rates, the school would move up to fifth in the country by 2008. Currently it is 11th.
The tools produced by the Medical School present such information in easy-to-understand graphs and charts. Many of these can be manipulated to show how changes in productivity, clinical revenue or research dollars would impact the Medical School as a whole or a particular department. With the charts and graphs produced by M-Dash, it is possible to see what individual faculty members need to do to reach certain targets.
"Think of a world in which we would know what the faculty is expecting to do over time," Elger says, "and matching those expectations with the resources needed to enable that to happen."
Providing access to all the administrators and department chairs has increased the level of transparency of information at the Medical School, says James Woolliscroft, M.D., executive associate dean.
"That is one of the greatest services these tools provide: They help us clear up misconceptions and they ensure that we are all working with accurate information," Woolliscroft says.
RSS