Supporting the academic mission in an era of constrained resources: approaches at the University of Arizona College of Medicine.

The authors describe initiatives at the University of Arizona College of Medicine to markedly expand faculty, build research along programmatic lines, and promote a new, highly integrated medical school curriculum. Accomplishing these goals in this era of declining resources is challenging. The authors describe their approaches and outcomes to date, derived from a solid theoretical framework in the management literature, to (1) support research faculty recruitment, emphasizing return on investment, by using net present value to guide formulation of recruitment packages, (2) stimulate efficiency and growth through incentive plans, by using utility theory to optimize incentive plan design, (3) distribute resources to support programmatic growth, by allocating research space and recruitment dollars to maximize joint hires between units with shared interests, and (4) distribute resources from central administration to encourage medical student teaching, by aligning state dollars to support a new integrated organ-system based-curriculum.

Timing of revenue streams from newly recruited faculty: implications for faculty retention.

Purpose: To determine the timing and magnitude of revenues generated by newly recruited faculty, to facilitate configuration of recruitment packages appropriately matched to expected financial returns.

Method: The aggregate of all positive cash flows to central college of medicine administration -- from research, clinical care, tuition, philanthropy, and royalties and patents, from all faculty newly recruited to the University of Arizona College of Medicine between 1998 and 2004 -- was quantified using the net present value (npv) methodology, which incorporates the time value of money.

Results: Tenure-track faculty and, in particular, those with laboratory research programs, generated the highest positive central cash flows.

Compensation in academic medicine: progress toward gender equity.

Background: Studies have documented substantial salary disparities between women and men in academic medicine. While various strategies have been proposed to increase equity, to our knowledge, no interventions have been evaluated.

Objective: This paper aims to assess the effect of an identity-conscious intervention on salary equity.

Gender differences in academic advancement: patterns, causes, and potential solutions in one US College of Medicine.

Purpose: The influx of women into academic medicine has not been accompanied by equality for male and female faculty. Women earn less than men in comparable positions, progress more slowly through academic ranks, and have not attained important leadership roles. This study tested hypotheses about why gender disparities exist in salary, rank, track, leadership, and perceptions of campus climate at one academic center, the University of Arizona College of Medicine, Tucson.