Health care management is one of the most important research topics in this country. Planning activities at Arizona State University have developed a consortium based research Center program in addressing the health care management problems. The formation of this Center is based on the early work supported by the Western Network for Education in Health Administration. The proposed Center program is to develop an integration of industry, Arizona State University, and the Western Network university consortium based on the NSF I/UCRC model. The initial research agenda of Arizona State University's I/UCRC for Health Care Management will address the following topics: 1) Develop new ways to organize and manage patient care units; 2) Changing relationships between physician and organization; 3) Implementing new approaches to managing quality and clinical outcomes. The Principal Investigator/Center Director and his colleagues with Arizona State University, Northwestern University, University of Colorado, University of Washington, and U.C. Berkeley have the knowledge and facilities to run this Center. This I/UCRC Program is being coordinated with Dr. John Castellan, Program Director of Decision, Risk, and Management Science Program at the National Science Foundation. The Program Manager recommends Arizona State University be awarded $50,000 for the first year of a five-year continuing award. Near the end of each 12-month period, the Program Manager and/or the Division Director of the Engineering Education Centers Division will review the progress of the Center on a number of renewal criteria, including the following: 1) the extent to which the university-industry interaction is developing; 2) the extent to which the support base is developing; 3) the extent to which a robust research program is developing. If the review is satisfactory, the Program Manager will recommend support for the next period of this continuing award.
