King's College's Graduate Program in Health Care Administration helps to achieve community wellness: a case study

Graduate programs in health care administration can become catalysts in the community wellness initiatives that the Institute of Medicine and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have identified as being critical to the improvement of public health among the U.S population. This paper examines the results of such a program at King's College, Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, which developed community wellness programs through the establishment of a center for health promotion, assisted in the establishment of a city health department, developed a peer leader tobacco education program for elementary school students, and produced a 30-minute video on adolescent high-risk behavior. The program's goal is to facilitate coalition building among health agencies and to produce graduates equipped with administrative skills and a thorough knowledge of the value of well-developed community wellness programs. Healthy communities will require the emergence of leaders who can gather information about high-risk health behaviors and work with communities to implement solutions. Health care administration programs have a tremendous opportunity to become catalysts in the development and implementation of educational programs that may improve a community's overall health and reduce health care costs.