The medical professional to student ratio at the Amelia T. Wood Health Center lags behind other area universities as the search for a new director continues.
Ball State’s Health Center has fewer medical directors, staff physicians and nurse practitioners to students compared to the University of Notre Dame, Indiana University and Purdue University.
Notre Dame has a ratio of about 1:1,695 and IU has a ratio of about 1:1,798 while Purdue has a ratio of 1:1,844. With Ball State down to a minimum staff of two doctors versus three or four, the ratio of a professional to students is about 1:2,275. This means one doctor has to be available for more than 500 extra students than a doctor at Notre Dame, 477 more students than IU and 431 more students than Purdue.
Approval has been received for the Health Center to hire another full-time physician, in addition to a full-time Health Center director to address the nearly 2,500 students that visit each month, according to the director job posting on medcv.com.
When a new doctor and physician are hired, the medical professional to student ration will change to 1:2,081, still behind Notre Dame, Purdue and IU.
In addition, the Ball State Health Center is not accredited by the American College Health Association. There are three universities in Indiana with accredited student health centers: IU, IUPUI and the University of Notre Dame.
The Accreditation Association of Ambulatory Health Care grants accreditation after an on-site survey by health care professionals and review by a committee. University health centers must apply to be surveyed for accreditation.
Charles Routh, executive director of physician practices at IU Health Ball Memorial Hospital, said Ball State’s Health Center director position has not been posted very long because there was not a large window of time after Kent Bullis announced his departure and when he left.
“Unfortunately, a lot of positions are already hired so we are keeping our fingers crossed there are a lot of people out there,” Routh said. “I suppose it’s like trying to hire a professor at this time in the year, but we are hoping to find some good quality people.”
The Health Center director is employed by IU Health Ball Memorial Physicians, not the Health Center itself.
According to the job posting on medcv.com, the position is half working with patients and half administrative work with 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. hours.
Routh said the hiring committee is looking for a board-certified physician in a primary care field who can go between working with students and administration.
“We are looking for someone with excellent communication skills who can speak just as easily to a patient as they can communicate with Ball State administration,” he said. “[We’re looking for] somebody who has experience directly caring for patients because part of the job is being a physician and also somebody who is going to be an effective administrator.”
Even though Ball Memorial employs the Health Center director, the hiring committee works in conjunction with the Health Center steering committee.
June Payne, director of Ball State’s Counseling and Health Services, works as a liaison between the Health Center and Ball Memorial and will participate in the hiring process along with Alan Hargrave, associate vice president of student affairs.
Payne said she values potential medical director candidates who are not only talented and well-trained, but who can understand the population they will serve.
“One of the things for me, personally, [that is] extremely important is a person who understands the university culture, who understands and has provided treatment, who has experience working with college-aged students and the issues they may be facing,” she said.
Payne said once a director is hired, it will be a good opportunity to discuss potential changes to the Health Center.
She puts together a student Health Center advisory board that meets once a semester to hear student feedback and concerns. The group has not been assembled for this year and will meet sometime in November.
She said the Health Center is working to address the main complaint students have, which is wait times.
“If we get one complaint for health care at Ball State, it is generally the wait time that students encounter,” Payne said. “We have gotten approval for getting another physician. That is [the number one thing] we want to have an impact on student wait time and providing the best quality of services we can.”
Since the start of the 2013 academic year, the Health Center has seen around 18,000 patients, said interim director Deidre Dorman. In the same time frame from the academic year 2012, the Health Center had around 17,600 visits and in total, there were 24,400 visits.
Ball Memorial is in the process of cutting 100 positions as part of a larger reduction at IU Health, said Will Henderson, director of public relations and marketing for the hospital.
Routh said these cuts cannot impact the Ball State Health Center because none of the cutbacks are in physicians and because Ball State and IU Health have a mutual relationship to provide those services.
