Adjusting, More M.D.’s Add M.B.A.

Adjusting, More M.D.’s Add M.B.A.

Under heavy pressure from government regulators and insurance companies, more and more physicians across the country are learning to think like entrepreneurs, reports Milt Freudenheim at the New York Times:

“All physicians need some kind of business training,” she said. “For example, some physicians with large research grants don’t know how to manage the money.”

As for the nation’s troubled health system, “we are not running the business side very well,” Dr. Chandler said. “Part of the problem is we don’t have physicians sufficiently involved. They have a fuller insight about what is needed.”

“Cue the theme music from ‘Jaws,’ ” said Professor Pauly, of Wharton. “Entrepreneurs have to know how to navigate with the desire of payers to hold down prices and control uses in health care.”

He added: “They have to know how to please pointy-headed bureaucrats. This is going to be one of the survival skills in the future in health care.”

Dr. James Kuo is nonexecutive chairman of a company headed by his wife, Dr. Geraldine Kuo.