Home Degrees & Programs Doctoral Degrees DHA Program Content, Structure & Delivery
DHA Program Content, Structure, and Delivery
I wanted to obtain the
highest credential to accelerate my career in academia. Without CMU's Doctor of
Health Administration (DHA) Program which caters to working adults in a flexible
way, I could not have obtained my DHA. The online format was challenging, vastly
interactive, and emphasized both theory and practical application. The
Professors were excellent facilitators online as well as conducting the
intensive face-to-face seminars. I would highly recommend the DHA Program to any
healthcare professional who wants to accelerate their career to a premier level.
Thank you CMU for an educational experience that exceeded all of my expectations
and the opportunity to meet some of the most talented minds across the US, both
faculty and students.
Dr. Yolanda S. Draine, MSA, DHA (2010)
Senior Vice President and Adjunct Professor
Memphis, Tennessee
Content
The 63 credit-hour DHA combines theory and practice in ways that allow you to make a
substantive contribution to your organization and to the larger health care
community. Your work in the program foster s your expanded knowledge in the
following areas:
- Leadership, change management, "influence strategies," and planning processes;
- Human interaction and communication at the individual, group and organizational
levels;
- Health communication, informatics, and information technology;
- Models in healthcare delivery systems including collaboration, mergers, and
acquisitions;
- Health care economic realities;
- Policy, regulation, and community;
- Qualitative, quantitative, and research methods to evaluate and apply
decision-making concepts;
- Contemporary human resource issues including diversity, poverty, human rights,
sexism, racism, and unionization;
and
- The role of values and ethics in contemporary health care organizations.
Strong advising, mentoring and tutoring (as required) will support you in your
quest to earn a doctoral degree including:
- an adviser (didactic portion of program)
- a major professor (dissertation)
Off-Campus Library Services (OCLS), acknowledged as the best distance delivery
library service in the education industry, offers you online research
assistance, document delivery (electronic and physical delivery service), and
general library services.
Structure
The DHA program is structured around the following five elements:
- A non-credit orientation to health administration doctoral studies at Central
Michigan University’s main campus in Mount Pleasant, Michigan.
- Eight internet modules consisting of 2 courses per module (with the exception of
the module four, which includes only 1 course)
- Six regionally-based intensive 2 ½ day seminars
- The seminars follow modules 2 through 7.
- Each seminar is worth 1 semester credit hour.
- Each seminar includes one or more subject matter experts drawn from outside the
course faculty.
- Seminars will be delivered both on the CMU campus and in regional cities
offering suitable student access and availability of seminar guest speakers.
Possible sites include Atlanta, Detroit, and Washington D.C. in the United
States. Geneva, Switzerland is a potential location for international study.
- A comprehensive examination in essay format will evaluate all didactic content
covered in the program.
- Individual applied dissertation, on an applied
research topic in a specific health care administrative area, chosen by you. The
dissertation must be a synthesis of knowledge and content in a specific health
care area that constitutes new knowledge to the field and is worthy of journal
submission and publication.
Cohort Delivery
Students who adhere to the
prescribed course delivery schedule will progress through the degree
requirements as a member of a cohort. All members who remain with a single
cohort will proceed through the carefully planned sequence of classes and
seminars together.
Students who elect an alternative schedule will be engaged in
their studies across multiple cohort groups. Regardless of the program pace a
student elects, they will have ample interaction with other students in the
program. Students will complete their dissertations as an individual effort,
with guidance from a committee of three professors.