Causes in Common: Health Care and Student Success
For CSUN students who want to study abroad, opportunities for campus based exchange programs span the globe from Limerick, Ireland to Hubei, China, and many places in between.
Louis Rubino, Professor and Director of the CSUN Health Administration Program, is driven by a desire to create opportunities for student success by promoting and teaching about the value of culture immersion as part of the college experience.
Most recently, he traveled to China to visit Hubei University of Medicine (HUM) to strengthen the bonds he forged on his first visit there in 2012. "On a trip like this, not only can I conduct research and teach based on investigation," Rubino said, "I can teach from experience about international health care issues, and expand our students' horizons for greater global awareness."
A Trip to Hubei University of Medicine
By Louis Rubino, Professor Health Sciences and Director Health Administration Program
Travel to China for CSUN has really made my academic career because of what I learn, and what it allows me to bring back to CSUN to share. So much good comes out of these partnerships; exchange creates opportunities for students to get the benefit of immersion into new cultures, experiential learning, and chances to develop global perspectives and expand their horizons through travel.
The emphasis of my research is on the operations of acute care hospitals, particularly their leadership and governance, and international health care reform. And over the past fifteen years, I’ve focused on China’s health care system to the extent that I have had four visiting professorships in the People’s Republic of China.
International academic partnerships also create opportunities for faculty to get involved in areas they might not otherwise discover, and we bring this knowledge back to our students at CSUN. For me, the 2015 trip to Hubei had an added feature—I was able to celebrate the 50th anniversary of HUM with my new colleagues.
I will admit that I was not expecting to be called upon for this trip, as the event was momentous for Hubei University of Medicine, and I had anticipated they would prefer one of our top leaders to attend.But, as it happened, the same week, CSUN was set to receive the “Eddy” Award for Economic Development, and so President Harrison, Provost Li and Interim Dean Abourezk needed to stay in town. They requested I attend the celebration at HUM, and I was honored to go.
Since I had first visited HUM in 2012, I was familiar with this university in the Central part of China, nestled in the beautiful Wudang Mountains. I arrived at HUM to discover that I was the only United States “dignitary” there, and I was treated with exceptional hospitality. While formal in many ways, these international visits also bring a natural ease to the day-to-day experience. The Health Minister from Nepal and the International Dean from a Singapore University stayed in the same hotel and so we toured and ate together for the four days we were in Shiyan. Casual conversation set a tone of easy exchange as we discussed and compared health care reform measures. I also learned about developments and practices in their countries, enriching the original research topic that had initially brought me to China fifteen years prior. Most countries are struggling with the same issues of health care cost, quality and access. It is interesting to see how the various countries are addressing this very important social issue.
And, as I got to know HUM’s President Hanjun Tu, I learned his career path paralleled mine in many ways. I was a hospital health administrator for over twenty years and began teaching at several colleges and universities before transitioning to a full time faculty position at CSUN. President Tu had also begun his career as a hospital administrator, moving into a career in academia at midlife. This created a bond between us, and even though his English was minimal, we had relatively easy communication about our common fields of interest.
A highlight of this trip was an opportunity to present my research to faculty and students at HUM during the university’s 50th Anniversary celebration. I presented a comparison of the US Affordable Care Act (“Obamacare”) to China’s five-year health plan, and of course this opened dialogues with the faculty and students in the HUM Public Health Administration program. Questions about our program and its curriculum at CSUN, which is similar to theirs in many ways led to greater curiosity about life at CSUN.
As it turned out, my 61st birthday was on November 8th. My birthday is the same date as the founding of HUM. I mentioned this during my presentation and was surprised to receive thunderous applause. Maybe my attending was meant to be? At a lunch banquet after the ceremony, they presented a special birthday cake which happened to be one of my favorite fruit and custard cakes—served with tomatoes on top of it (well, the tomato is a fruit).
Getting home involved a five hour drive to the airport in a neighboring city and a twelve hour flight, but the benefits of the trip were well worth the journey. I was pleased to have been asked to represent CSUN at this event. I felt very special representing not only our university, but also the United States.
Louis Rubino had a twenty year management career as a hospital administrator and health system executive. His last position outside academia was as Vice President of Paracelsus Healthcare, a public hospital management company based in Houston, Texas. Rubino was in charge of the operations of their California facilities (eleven acute care, four skilled nursing). Read Louis Rubino's bio.
Hubei University of Medicine (HUM) has over 15,000 full-time students, over 1,000 faculty and staff, and offers 12 undergraduate programs including public health administration, medicine, nursing, medical imaging, and rehabilitation therapy. The university hosts five first-rate level three hospitals which are the highest level hospitals in the country, with 6,000,000 out-patients and 300,000 in-patients annually. HUM is also developing graduate programs, recruiting overseas students and providing continuing education. For more information on the relationship between CSUN and HUM, visit the CSUN International and Exchange Student Center’s HUM page.