Financial Management in Health Care

Masters in Health Care Administration

MHA 580

Breyer State University
Instructor: Dale Mueller, EdD, RN

SYLLABUS

COURSE OVERVIEW: Welcome to Health Care Finance, a course that is designed with for health care managers and administrators. This course demonstrates applications of managerial financial principles and concepts as applied to health care financial decisions and planning in both for-profit and not-for-profit settings in the United States today.

The goal of this graduate course is to prepare health care administrators for the financial and managerial decisions involved in maintaining a well-managed health care organization. A review of vocabulary and concepts are presented in this course, as well as applications of financial analysis in managerial decision making as commonly seen in health care environments. Topics covered in this course include the management cycle; revenues and expenses; cost classifications and cost behaviors; staffing and FTEs; forecasting; budgets and variance analysis; and financial performance measures such as ratio analysis.

This course includes hands-on experience in working with spreadsheets through information obtained in organization case studies.

TIME FRAME: This is a four (4) semester hour course. This course is allotted ten weeks of time. You must complete all of the requirements for the course successfully by the end of the ten-week period. The first day of week one will begin the day that you register for the course, or the day that you notify me that your textbook has arrived and you are ready to begin your studies.

It is up to you to comply with the time frames for assignments and completion of this course. Extensions are granted only for extenuating circumstances, and must be agreed upon by both you and I. Upon successful completion of this course, you will be awarded four (4) semester hours of credit.

TEXTBOOKS: There is one required textbook for this course.

Book 1: Baker, J., & Baker, R. Health care finance. Aspen: Gaithersberg, MD. (2000). ISBN # 0-8342-1206-4.

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EXAMINATIONS: There are two units for this course.

Unit One consists of an online multiple choice – true/false exam that covers basic vocabulary and concepts. The Unit One multiple choice exam may be taken any time between the first and fifth week of this course. Notify me for electronic access to this online exam.

Unit Two consists of worksheet demonstrations and a 5-10 page application paper. Unit Two will commence after the Unit One examination has been completed, and may be submitted to me at any time up through the tenth week of this course.

Details for Unit Two are provided in this syllabus. Spreadsheets for the worksheet demonstrations are provided on Excel, or you are free to compose your own worksheets.

You must complete the Unit One examination by the 5th week in the course (20 points possible).

You must complete the Unit Two documents by the 10th week in the course (80 points possible). Incomplete work will be graded accordingly.

Send your completed Unit Two materials to my e-mail address. I will return your paper to you with feedback, including your grade.

GRADING: The grading scale for this course is as follows:

90-100%    = A
80-89%      = B
70-79%      = C
Below 70% = Fail

The grading for the Unit One multiple choice exam is calculated from the number of answers correct. There are no penalties for incorrect answers (other than a zero score for that question). Total points possible is 20 points.

The grading criteria for the Unit Two written assignment is as follows:

CONTENT and LEVEL: (written paper): 50 points
1). Content is pertinent, and reflects critical elements requested from the readings, applications, and workplace applications.
2). Comprehensiveness of discussion.
3). The discussion as requested addresses the assignment in scope and content.
4). The composition is of appropriate academic level, including spelling, grammar and formatting.

SPREADSHEET APPLICATIONS: 30 points
1). The applications are clear, and demonstrate appropriate use of the procedure.
2). The applications are correct.
3). The assignment is complete.

COMMUNICATION: You may reach me through this course via e-mail.

ABOUT YOUR INSTRUCTOR: Dale Mueller, EdD, RN, has held numerous leadership and management roles in large and small health care organizations throughout her career as an administrator and consultant. Roles include leadership for change in chaotic environments, and management of teams, work groups, task forces and organizations. She is a gubernatorial appointee in strategic planning and human resources in California, and is a former President of the Chamber of Commerce in her community.

COURSE OBJECTIVES: The objectives for this course are:

1). Describe elements of financial management and the role of the health care manager.
2). Describe organization information flow and the annual management cycle.
3). Describe revenue and related financial concepts such as contractual allowance, types of revenue generation, and grouping of revenue for planning and control.
4). Distinguish between expense and cost, and the role of cost tracking and cost reporting.
5). Describe direct and indirect costs, the role of responsibility centers, and the importance of these concepts to financial management.
6). Describe the components of a break-even analysis, such as volume and contribution margin.
7). Distinguish elements of staffing, such as productive time, FTE calculations, and relationships to cost.
8). Discuss trend analysis and forecasting as management tools.
9). Discuss budgets including components of flexible budgets and budget variance analysis.
10). Discuss the time value of money and application to managerial decisions.
11). Describe financial reports such a balance sheet, statement of revenue and expense and statement of cash flow.
12). Discuss applications of ratio analysis and their use in managerial decisions.
13). Discuss financial performance measures such as benchmarking.
14). Analyze the elements that were discussed or described in this course in relation to operations case applications.
15). Evaluate the role of the manager in relation to the financial tools and documents that are covered in this course.

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