Transforming Academic Health Centers for an Uncertain Future

With a changing health care landscape and a growing gap between the excess costs of fulfilling academic health centers' missions and the available funding, the integrity of those missions is in jeopardy. Profound changes are needed in AHCs' organization and operations. Academic health centers (AHCs) have long led the advancement of science and medicine by pursuing missions of clinical care, research, and education. AHCs have been places where important fundamental and translational research is performed and medical innovations are created and tested. Given the dramatic changes ahead in health care and deteriorating research funding, can this record of achievement continue, or do AHCs in the United States face a growing risk of extinction?(1) Despite their substantial societal value, these centers have an uncertain future. The health care landscape is changing rapidly owing to the Affordable Care Act, state budget deficits, and ...