Teaching Hospitals

Academic medical centers and teaching hospitals fulfill critical social missions, including educating and training future medical professionals; conducting state-of-the-art research; caring for the poor and uninsured; and optimizing services to provide highly specialized clinical care to the most severely ill and injured patients.

There are over 1,000 teaching hospitals that directly employ 2.7 million people and are among the largest employers in their communities.

Engaging Teaching Hospital Leaders

The AHA fosters dialogue among academic medical center and teaching hospital leaders and offers many opportunities to take an active role in shaping AHA policies and setting direction for the association and the field. They may have a formal role in association governance and/or policy formation by serving on AHA’s Board of Trustees, Committee on Health Strategy and Innovation, Regional Policy Boards, or Councils and Committees. In addition, academic medical center and teaching hospital leaders can participate on:

  • Academic Medical Center Strategic Leadership Group that drives the AHA academic medical center and teaching hospital strategy and advocacy agenda and addresses graduate medical education funding, workforce issues, the 340B Drug Pricing Program, site-neutral payments and rising drug prices.
  • Committee on Clinical Leadership, which offers hospital-based physicians a unique opportunity to participate in AHA’s broader policy and advocacy activities and to more specifically weigh in on clinical and quality policy issues.
  • Metropolitan Hospitals Council, which advises AHA on policy and advocacy issues impacting academic medical centers, teaching hospitals, public and urban hospitals.
  • Advocacy Alliances including the Advocacy Alliance for Graduate Medical Education, the Advocacy Alliance for the 340B Drug Discount Program and the Advocacy Alliance for Coordinated Care.
  • Leadership Briefings for small groups of executives to discuss care delivery and financing approaches, demonstrations, pilots and initiatives.

Read on for more, including resources and news specific to teaching hospitals and their unique mission.