The Duke University Hospital Administrative Fellowship: Emma Creech

<p>hello everyone this is Cole from the American Journal of healthc care strategy I'm joined by Emma an administrative fellow at Duke Emma please introduce yourself hi everyone thank you all for listening in today my name is Emma Cree as Cole mentioned I currently a first year administrative fellow at Duke University Hospital I'm a part of the Duke Health System excited to be here today [Music] we're really excited to have you duke is as you know a very popular institution from their undergrad graduate programs and of course Duke uh hospital system is incredible I've utilized it myself many times when uh I was living in the Raleigh area so we're really excited to talk to you about that but not just because of Duke I also want to go back to the very beginning when you were at EC and you got your degree in public health I believe right I did yes I got my degree from ECU in public health what was the reason that you went into that uh Public Health route to begin with yeah of course so I am from North Carolina I was born in Raley which is more urban but grew right up outside of Raleigh in smaller towns Clayton Garner Smithfield so have always called North Carolina home and have always felt called to serve not only within health care but within my local community as well I went to ECU I was a part of the Honors College I love my time at ECU my mom and my grandfather went to ECU so it's a bit of our tradition in our family but yes I actually started out at ECU and trying to do nursing very quickly realized that maybe that was not the best pathway for me and so I pivoted over and shifted to Public Health and I really enjoyed the courses in public health I really had a good time there that is awesome and you know ECU I think is a really good school because their goal is to create professionals that will serve North Carolina I want to ask when you were kind of growing up in this area I was in North Raleigh in the night Dale area my parents now live uh just below Fu and so I'm familiar with that area what were some of the public health problems that you saw when you were growing up that inspired you to want to work in in the field yeah really access is a big thing in North Carol in especially in eastern North Carolina um just generally just depending kind of on the area like I mentioned some parts of the state especially those closer to ECU or much more rural individuals have a tough time you know with Transportation getting to and from doctor's appointments paying for care a portion of the state is heavily uninsured or underinsured and so just working to make sure that we can provide better services for the community here has kind of been a passion of mine I could not agree more I think that's a wonderful passion I want to ask with that you know Public Health passion you enjoyed the course work you did very well clearly I want to ask why did you go the mha route instead of mph route what was that decision like for you yeah yeah great question I get asked that a lot I've always been drawn to kind of leadership positions and supporting others as much as I can but also continuing my own personal um growing educationally personally professionally and so when I was doing the public health route at ECU I loved my courses but I actually had an opportunity during my last semester where really to maintain my full-time scholarship I needed to take a few more additional courses at ECU so I had the opportunity to take some classes within their health services Management program that really was a great experience it was my first introduction learning more about business and Leadership but merging that with the context of the public health program that I had learned about for the past two years and that really I guess kind of inspired and encouraged me to go more so into Health Administration transparently I I knew there were people that ran hospitals and doctor's office but I didn't know much about the health administration career path or what that Journey looks like for people I didn't really know many people in healthcare administration and so my last semester ECU when I I was taking some of those courses through that program I was introduced and was encouraged to go the mha route and so that's kind of what led me from there I think that it was a great decision it it seems like it was something that you're really were passionate about and clearly you've done very well since that I do want to ask though why did you go to VCU you know North Carolina of course we got UNCC Charlotte which I went to UNC Charlotte for the first couple years of my degree we have you know Gillings which has an excellent mha program so what was the reason for VCU yeah I applied to several different mha programs um I was very fortunate and lucky to get into vcu's program it's one of the top programs there's so many great um here within the state of North Carolina and the surrounding areas I did personally want to stay a bit more geographically local to the area which is why I was also interested in moving to Richmond for vcu's program their program at least in my experience also has a really strong empasis on leadership development but also on business there are some other programs in the state and across the nation that do that as well I felt comfortable with my understanding and background in public health because that's what I graduated from ECU with and so transitioning into a master's program I was really looking for a school or a program that could fill in some of those gaps in which I had identified and and VCU was the place for me absolutely because I noticed on there it looks like VCU also got you those certificates from the hfma right and not every institution does that right I think that's a only a few of them really give you that Financial backing right very true yeah so those are actually through the finance courses at VCU the crcr certification through hfma we got in one of our classes it was built into the curriculum of the course just something like an additional assignment kind of homework that we had to do and then VCU very recently has created some additional certific programs that you can add on to your master's degree or doctoral degree anyone at VCU or anywhere is welcome to sign up for those particular programs um but yes like you mentioned the finance one in particular um I did that and really enjoyed it and part of the curriculum for the certificate was to complete additional courses through hfma which students get kind of a complimentary membership through during their time of ECU oh excellent so you don't have to pay any of the extra yeah yeah we get a student membership and then it's kind of built into the curriculum so it's super convenient and really awesome how did you like living in Richmond there because of course it's a bit different than Raleigh you know you you drive through Richmond and the traffic just starts to pick up heading into the DC area so what was it like living there oh my gosh I loved loved loved my time living in Richmond I moved back to North Carolina last June and every single day I miss Richmond so much I've spent several weekends going back to Richmond going to some some of my favorite restaurants and places to hang out watching The Flying Squirrels baseball games those are my favorite but I really love my time living in richment everything is very local within the city as it relates to what I was required to do as a part of my Master's programs additional kind of volunteering and internship opportunities I had so my apartment was very close to school it's Richmond is such a pretty city I would go to class go to my internship be able to walk along the James River go out to a nice dinner with some friends my family was able to travel up on the weekend so Richmond is an awesome place I like to hear that because of course there's so many different options within the area and so I really like people to Showcase what they like about these different areas and then it's nice that you've been able to try different things out as well that you might not have have tried previously so that's excellent during that uh VCU program mha I want to ask you know what was required in terms of the internship I know you this internship in Richmond at the vascular surgery associates was that one of the the kind of bigger required internships as part of the degree so VCU doesn't necessarily require that students complete an internship during the program although it is highly recommended and I personally was looking for an opportunity like that so that I could translate what I was learning into the classroom into you know real life or the the real kind of healthc care field I was fortunate enough to connect with one of the alumni of ecu's program her name is Laura um and she is the administrator of vascular surgery associates they're a private practice within Virginia one of the only private vascular surgery practices but each of their providers and owners are credential at the local hospitals to operate and see patients there which is really neat um but I personally kind of I went straight from high school to undergrad to grad school very quickly and so didn't have a lot of opportunity outside of scho school to gain exposure like a lot of my class members had and so that internship in particular was a really kind of pivotal moment for me I was really introduced to healthcare administration in more of like I mentioned a private practice setting but also getting to see all that there was to do as a healthc care administrator as my preceptor during that opportunity really had her eyes and hands and ears on everything that was happening at the different sites and I was very lucky to be able to support her along with one of my co- interns um for about a year and a half at VSA that is awesome and I want to ask how did you get connected with some of these internship opportunities as you were just talking about you didn't have that experience that's a struggle for many students including myself so how did you get those opportunities yeah well I think fortunately um and at least this was the case for different mha programs that I was looking at is there're in really Health Centric areas so opportunities kind of arise just based on different organizations that are around so just by looking online it was not necessarily easy but there were opportunities available to apply to but VCU does at least in my opinion a really great job of connecting students with alumni of the program who have similar interests and you know passions and goals as they do and so in coming to the program all of the local internship opportunities are ones that prior students have held in the past are posted publicly for students to apply to or interview with or learn more about if they're interested so that's personally how I got connected um with that particular opportunity one of the the good benefits of going to VCU as well there so uh you know we encourage everyone to look into that program and to apply transitioning from VCU though to the postgraduate kind of Life what were your thoughts going into that did you want to do a fellowship did you want to go straight into practice and then you know what was kind of the reason for your decision yeah so VCU is a three-year mha program there aren't many of those remaining but that's something that I was looking for when I was looking at mha programs too the first two years of the program are fully dactic and then the third year you're in a residency or a fellowship really applying those learnings from the first two year on in an onsite opportunity with a healthcare organization um for me I was looking definitely for some kind of postgraduate Extended Learning opportunity because I didn't personally feel like I had enough experience necessarily to go straight into being a healthcare administrator or in some sort of managerial role um I applied to a few different residencies through VCU but then applied also to I think maybe three or four Fellowship opportunities at different programs most within this region of the United States because that was something that was a part of my personal decision criteria was to kind of stay local and give back to the community that I had grown up within and so yes um decided to pursue administrative Fellowship got interviews with a few places and was very lucky and fortunate to have been extended an offer to be a fellow with Duke how many places did you apply to in total yeah in total six or seven three of which were fellowships and the rest were the residencies the rest were the residencies through VCU very comparable to Fellowship opportunities just not nationally available okay and then how did that kind of decision come to itself was Duke the first to give you an offer with their multiple offers what did that look like for you yeah so I interviewed with a few of the local Health Systems around here Duke's timeline was a few weeks more advanced than some of the other organizations patients that I was interviewing with but they were also my top choice transparently and so I received an offer from them in early October of last year and was more than excited to accept it congratulations of course we know you've been there for a year but uh I think it's an incredible accomplishment looking back to the very beginning though of that application process why was Duke your first choice yeah Duke was my first choice well so my family has a bit of a personal connection to Duke not even really the hospital or the health system but more so on the University side my grandfather actually played football at Duke and he was an art major there and he's a he was a local artist and so some of his artwork is on the campus and so I just grew up very frequently going to football games and basketball games and have so many good memories there associated with the Duke system in general with my family but also being in North Carolina that again was an area that I wanted to be back with then something about Duke in particular the fellowship program is 2 years long I was looking for something also that was a bit more structured especially in the beginning so as a part of the two-year fellowship program the first year is all rotational based our health system has a few different administrative Fellowship opportunities to apply to I applied only to um the one at University Hospital which is our Flagship Hospital in Durham North Carolina it's a very large academic Medical Center over a thousand beds level one Trauma Center I was looking for something with rotation throughout this first year my co- fellow and I have completed gosh probably 20 to 25 different rotations with all of the different service lines and departments at the hospital but this past spring have also had an opportunity to learn more about the system um and the different entities within the system and I've enjoyed that too and then in um June or July of this year 2024 we'll be transitioning into our second year where we'll be taking kind of a deeper focused dive and supporting one area in particular wow that's uh pretty comprehensive and I I see why you enjoy choosing that and of course Duke especially the University Hospital uh there in Durham is special because you get some of the medical tourism as they call it you get people traveling from all over North Carolina to reach some those Specialists and when you of course pull up to it it is truly an impressive institution that and the unc's University Hospital they're both very large and there's always construction going on they're always building more there was always very much a lot of construction going on at many of the hospitals here in North Carolina but I do I truly enjoy going into work every day parking the parking lot and walk a couple minutes from where my parking spot is up into the office and to kind of see the architecture of you know the camp and the gardens and everything just is is really awesome I want to ask you know what were some of the the very best or or not the very best but some of the maybe the different things that you've experienced that you didn't know you were going to like but you ended up liking yeah yeah of course I think I had kind of a general understanding or exposure to you know when you think of hospitals or healthc care you think of you know very common sort of service lines oncology neuro things like that what I was most surprised by and interested in were our Support Services we spent a period of about three weeks with our patient flow and support services teams at the hospital and got to spend time with our EVS staff our food staff in the kitchen we worked at Starbucks for a little bit and made some drinks and so that was a really great opportunity for me to learn from those team members but also understand how while the clinical service are at the Forefront of the operations of a Health Care System there really truly is this whole other section of the system that really supports it running and on the day-to-day operations so I really enjoyed that let's talk about that more for a second because we've heard the experiences of some students where they are involved in some pretty unusual things they're doing you know compliance for construction and things like that but I have not heard the Starbucks yet so so let's let's back up for a minute and talk about that what was that exactly like so uh yeah my co- fellow Bri and I we spent two or three days with some of our retail Food Services representatives and members of those teams and learning about what they do and how our partnership with their different companies work and so yes one morning we were given an apron and a viser Starbucks official and we put those on in our office and walked to one of the Starbucks and the hospitals and actually got to stand back with the Baristas and the managers of that particular site and kind of learn about the different drinks and then we didn't prepare them with a lot for a lot of people because it's it's a very very busy location within the hospital but when when it died down a bit we had an opportunity to go up and practice making a few drinks for ourselves and for some of our other team members so that was that was really awesome and very memorable we have lots of pictures from that experience that is super cool so going into that second year you you know it's a huge hospital but you actually must know a lot of people right because you've been in areas all around the hospital that you wouldn't have even found yourself normally yeah we do we know a ton of people which is really great um and I think something about Duke's Fellowship that maybe is a bit unique we spend the first month or two really when we start meeting doing like 30 minute to 1 hour meet and greets with all of the different leaders in the different areas and then of course do our rotations we get to know them and their teams as well as Frontline team members a bit better so it it is a very very large place but it's really nice to be able to walk around and recognize people and be like oh you know I rotated with your team a few months ago and had this really awesome experience and and were with them for short periods of time but for you know all day when we're with them and so getting the to know them and what their passion is and why they're interested and why they're at Duke and what they're excited about is really great a great way for us as fellows to network and learn more but also just to cultivate those meaningful connections with our team members it sounds like a wonderful experience and that's one of the things I like about institutions like Duke and we've also interviewed people from Mayo is you get to meet people who are involved in some pretty kind of weird and interesting stuff that is is really you would never meet otherwise and so I would ask you you know what you're looking to do next but of course you have a year left so we're going to postpone those questions until our next conversation a year or so from now but I do want to ask you've been so successful you're doing great it seems like in this uh Fellowship what recommendations do you have for people earlier in their career like myself to succeed in their Fellowship to Su succeed in their degree and get these opportunities well I think it's really important to establish what your personal why is and really be intentional throughout your journey if you have the opportunity to do so I think for me starting out at ECU in a nursing capacity and then switching over to Public Health was a really pivotal and somewhat transformational time within my early career journey and then of course getting my mha at VCU was a great opportunity too and really I believe set me up to be successful in getting a fellowship at Duke so that would be my advice to really understand what it is you're passionate about and what you're seeking to learn for me I I knew I wanted to be in healthcare but I didn't know exactly what within healthcare administration and it's a great career field because there's so so many different things that you can do as a healthcare administrator and with within leadership in health care and so finding an opportunity that'll give you the availability to kind of explore a bit more and understand what it is that you like and enjoy has personally for me been something that I think has um helped set me up for Success what are your motivations have you narrowed that down a year in or is that something you're still working on navigating throughout your second year yeah I would say that's something I'm still working on navigating a bit in my second year I didn't have much exposure to what hospital level Administration was like prior to my fellowship I worked in a private practice and I really loved being able to work you know arm in-arm with the Physicians and the nursing staff on a day-to-day basis and support them but I'm finding that I also have the opportunity to do that in a hospital hospital setting and work with so many other team members as well my my goal really um in defining what the next year of my fellowship looks like and what a potential role postfellowship would be would be to really do as much as I can to empower those around me with the tools and the skill sets that I've developed and hope to keep developing so that we're all on the same page and are really truly advancing Health together which is what Duke's kind of like tagline and motto is but something that really um I hold close to my heart a little bit so your why for now is to create that impact and to figure out how that impact fits into the the bigger picture so I love that that's excellent thank you so much for coming on Emma I've really enjoyed our conversation and I look forward uh in the next year or so to be speaking with you again as you enter into your you know full-time professional role so thank you so much for joining today thank you so much for having me Cole</p>