ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, December 31, 1996 TAG: 9612310116
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-5 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: RICHMOND
SOURCE: Associated Press
After four years of college and four more years in medical school, Dr. Casey McReynolds is back in the classroom.
There are no books or exams, though this could be the most important course that McReynolds will take before completing his radiology residency at the Medical College of Virginia.
The subject? The business of medicine.
``Especially for Medical Residents'' is the official name of this new program. But it's more aptly dubbed survival training for young physicians, who are entering medicine at a time of tumultuous change - and doing so while carrying education debts that often top $100,000.
Until now, physicians-in-training were given little, if any, practical information on business and financial decisions.
``I've talked to several doctors in private practice who say medicine is a business. But we're not exposed to that,'' said McReynolds, a 26-year-old from St.Paul in Southwest Virginia.
``It was a concern of mine in medical school,'' he added. ``Doctors come out pretty ignorant. We're easy prey.''
The new program is trying to change that by giving medical residents a hefty dose of practical knowledge on everything from personal finance to health law, medical marketing to bedside ethics, insurance billing procedures to organizing a medical practice.
Medical students often get no advice on how to cope with their school loans, which typically begin accruing interest charges immediately, rather than delaying those costs like some undergraduate lending programs.
``We allow them to get into debt without understanding it,'' said MCV's director of graduate medical education, Mary Alice O'Donnell, who noted that the average debt load for graduates of public medical schools such as MCV is well over $70,000.
Setting MCV's program apart from those at other schools is the number and depth of practice-related courses being offered, said Dr. Hermes Kontos, vice president for health sciences.
MCV's program draws on Virginia Commonwealth University's finance, business and health administration experts - not just medical faculty - to teach the eight one-credit courses in subjects including medical finance, practice operations, computer literacy and risk management.
``When I started, I thought I'd just be treating patients,'' Kontos said. ``But the practice of medicine is very complex now. You need to know a little bit about a lot of things. You need business practices, accounting, law.''
LENGTH: Medium: 53 linesby CNB