Contacts: Kerry Parke, kparke@hbs.edu, (617) 495-6931
Leah Gourley, leah_gourley@hms.harvard.edu, (617) 432-0442
HARVARD'S BUSINESS AND MEDICAL SCHOOLS CELEBRATE NEW MD/MBA PROGRAM
Novartis CEO Dan Vasella Delivers Keynote on Need for Multifaceted Leaders in Healthcare Industry
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| Dan Vasella at MD/MBA launch Photo: Neal Hamberg |
BOSTON - Harvard Medical School (HMS) and Harvard Business School (HBS) recently celebrated the official start of Harvard University’s joint MD/MBA program with a special event on the HBS campus. Daniel L. Vasella, MD, chairman and CEO of pharmaceutical giant Novartis AG, delivered the evening’s keynote address on the compatibility of business and medicine before an audience that included the first seven students enrolled in the program. Announced last year, the innovative five-year program has been specially designed to foster intellectual integration of the medical and management disciplines by combining the curricula of both the Business and Medical Schools.
The MD/MBA program aims to develop outstanding physician leaders who will go on to hold positions of influence and thus contribute substantially to the health and well-being of individuals and society. At the celebration, HBS Dean Jay Light introduced Dr. Vasella, a graduate of one of Harvard Business School’s Executive Education programs (57th Program for Management Development, 1989), as an example of the type of leader the MD/MBA program will produce.
“If you ask me to describe in a nutshell what we’re trying to do with the joint program, it’s to create an ongoing flow of people like Dan Vasella – people who combine truly brilliant skills as physicians in the world of medicine with great leadership skills and knowledge of how to build, drive, develop, and manage an organization,” said Light. “There is a great need for people like that in the world today and an even bigger need for them in the future.”
Students seeking to participate in the Harvard MD/MBA program must apply to both schools simultaneously. The select group admitted to both institutions will typically spend their first three years at HMS, completing preclinical and clinical requirements, along with courses in healthcare policy and management and a four- to eight-week management internship in the summer following the first year. The fourth year will be at HBS, where they will complete the requirements of the first-year MBA core curriculum. In the fifth and final year, they will take electives at both HMS and HBS in a sequence independently determined by each student.
In his address, Vasella discussed the advantages of earning dual degrees in medicine and business. “Business knowledge can improve the efficiency and productivity of our healthcare system, as we search for better solutions,” said Vasella. “Synergies also exist in our logic and in our thinking processes: observation, data collection, diagnosis, intervention, and monitoring. In clinical medicine as in business, you have to understand the full situation to make the right diagnosis, to ask the right questions, to collect appropriate additional facts, to judge urgency, and to decide on strategy and actions. However, what’s most important in both disciplines is to develop a holistic view including not only so-called hard facts, but also psychosocial and cultural aspects – in other terms the human factor.”
The MD/MBA program is the latest addition to Harvard’s long-established family of joint programs, including those that HMS conducts with the Harvard School of Public Health and the John F. Kennedy School of Government (KSG); and that HBS does with Harvard Law School and the Kennedy School.
Additional information about the MD/MBA program can be found here:
http://www.hbs.edu/mba/academics/mdmba.html
About Harvard Business School
Founded in 1908 as part of Harvard University, Harvard Business School (http://www.hbs.edu) is located in Boston and offers full-time programs leading to the MBA and doctoral degrees, as well as more than 40 Executive Education programs. With a faculty of more than 200 distinguished scholars, the School is dedicated to educating leaders who make a difference in the world. Its core focus is to shape the practice of business, build enduring knowledge, and effectively communicate important ideas.
About Harvard Medical School
Harvard Medical School (http://www.hms.harvard.edu) has more than 7,000 full-time faculty working in 10 academic departments housed on the School's Boston quadrangle or in one of 48 academic departments at 18 Harvard teaching hospitals and research institutes. Those Harvard hospitals and research institutions include Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Cambridge Health Alliance, The CBR Institute for Biomedical Research, Children's Hospital Boston, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Forsyth Institute, Harvard Pilgrim Health Care, Joslin Diabetes Center, Judge Baker Children's Center, Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary, Massachusetts General Hospital, Massachusetts Mental Health Center, McLean Hospital, Mount Auburn Hospital, Schepens Eye Research Institute, Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital, and the VA Boston Healthcare System.