Summer Internship: New Ulm Medical Center

Spending the day in meetings at one of Allina's
 beautiful facilities (St. Francis Regional Medical Center)
By: Morgan Smith (MHA/MBA '17)
I am spending my summer in lovely little New Ulm, MN, interning at the New Ulm Medical Center (NUMC). This internship has allowed me to experience first-hand the trials and victories of a rural medical center that is truly living the “triple aim” – through excellent patient care and experience, as well as consistent efforts to reduce costs and boost value to all stakeholders.

NUMC is a thriving part of Allina Health – a large integrated healthcare system that operates throughout the state of Minnesota and even dips into Wisconsin.

Being a part of a larger system affords NUMC cost-savings, efficiency, and protection in many areas. For example, payer relations (negotiations) operate at a system rather than hospital level. However, being a small medical center in a 12 hospital and 61 clinic system means that NUMC’s senior leadership team has to actively advocate on behalf of the system, it’s patients, and community. Striking an appropriate balance between standardization and customization between the different sites of Allina is an activity that necessitates constant engagement at the regional and system levels.

I’ve been lucky to work on a wide variety of projects and shadow a variety of roles. For example, I’ve coordinated with providers at NUMC as well as project managers from Allina corporate to help push NUMC’s Telehealth program forward (another example of NUMC living the triple aim by integrating with the larger Allina system to provide value to their community). I’ve also created several financial analyses to aid in decisions about bringing additional providers on-board. I had the opportunity to shadow a float nurse, a “CEO Summit,” and was able to present to the Board of Directors during my first month on the job.

It’s been a whirlwind experience and my next few weeks are packed full of shadowing opportunities, meetings all over the state of Minnesota, and projects to complete! The work is fulfilling, but so is my free time outside of work. New Ulm is an adorable historic German town, with beautiful running/biking paths. I’ve also been able to travel to Minneapolis frequently (less than a 2 hour drive!) to enjoy the vibe of my favorite city on earth. 

I hope everyone is having a wonderful summer!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Devante Davis (MHA '24): UCHealth - Southern Region

Image
Hello my name is Devante Davis I am going into my 2 nd year as an MHA student at the University of Iowa!    I am currently interning at UCHEALTH southern region in Colorado Springs, and UCHEALTH mission statement is to Improve lives through providing quality care. My preceptor is Andrew Ritchie the Chief Operation Officer of the UCHEALTH southern region. He great a developing talent while unlocking hiding potential within his interns, and fellow! My favorite project was evaluating what the rest of the world is doing to recover from this global nursing shortage. Summarizing the data and be a part of creating a valuable plan to implement into the UCHEALTH southern region. A few other fun events I attended were the pikes peak annual racing event, viper’s baseball game, the incline!  
Read more

Alexa Colella (MHA '24): revology

Image
Hello! My name is Alexa Colella and I am an incoming 2nd year Master of Health Administration student at the University of Iowa. My professional interests include entrepreneurship, workplace culture and health, holistic health, health innovation, and health technology. My personal interests include weightlifting, hiking, traveling, thrill-seeking, theatre, reading, animal documentaries, and photography. This summer, I am completing an administrative internship with revology , in the heart of downtown Iowa City. r evology is a technology-enabled revenue cycle management startup firm that helps providers get more from their revenue cycle . Our good humans and smart technology enable health systems across the U.S. to transform their revenue cycle management process , adding more to their bottom line. My preceptor this summer is Chris Klitgaard , the CEO of revology . Chris is an alumnus of our MHA program and has been working in revenue cycle for most of his career. He has started
Read more

Adriana Kotchkoski (MHA '24): Nihon Keiei Consulting Group

Image
Konnichiwa from Japan!   As I sit down to write this blog post, I am filled with a sense of gratitude and accomplishment as I reflect on my time as an intern at Nihon Keiei Consulting Group in Osaka, Japan. This summer has been nothing short of remarkable, offering me a unique blend of professional development and cultural immersion that I will cherish forever.   During my time at Nihon Keiei, I had the opportunity to engage in in-depth research and analysis, creating comprehensive market profiles for the healthcare sectors in the Philippines and India. These profiles laid the foundation for strategic expansion plans, and it was an honor to present my findings and recommendations to a senior consultant during insightful one-on-one meetings. These interactions were not only professionally enriching but also allowed me to witness firsthand how strategic decisions shape the course of an organization's growth.   One of the most rewarding experiences during my internship was the develop
Read more