Exciting Health Admin Job Opportunities: Making the Most of Your Healthcare Administration Degree

Published on: September 9, 2023

Healthcare administration is a rapidly growing and evolving sector that calls for a new generation of talented and highly passionate professionals. With strong demand and a variety of job opportunities to suit every type of employee, this field is an excellent option for anyone who aspires to work in healthcare but prefers to avoid clinical roles.

With health admin jobs, there is still a strong emphasis on improving the patient experience — but through the strategic use of administrative processes that streamline day-to-day operations in medical facilities and beyond. This gives you the best of both worlds: the opportunity to make a difference along with stability and high job satisfaction.

The first step to accomplishing all this? Securing a health administration degree. This will equip you with a variety of relevant and in-demand skills while also giving you an edge among potential employers.
The return on investment for this degree can be considerable, especially if you enter one of the field’s most in-demand niches. We will highlight these in detail below, revealing where you might work or which responsibilities you might hold in your future healthcare administrator career.

What Can You Do With a Health Administration Degree?

A healthcare administration degree empowers you to pursue a wide variety of compelling career paths. Not to be confused with the Master of Business Administration in Healthcare, a targeted healthcare admin degree (such as a master’s in healthcare administration) equips you not only with a thorough understanding of the healthcare field but also high-level analytical and administrative skills that can prove beneficial for many health administration careers or niches.

What’s more, you will enjoy ample opportunities to develop highly valued soft skills, such as communication, collaboration, empathy and attention to detail. Upon graduation, you should feel confident in your skill set and prepared to impress potential employers.

Common Industries for a Career in Health Administration

Health administrators work in many environments, ranging from medical facilities to corporate offices and government agencies. Some are even able to work from home, as remote jobs have become increasingly prevalent and popular these last few years. Top locations that call for skilled healthcare administrators include:

Hospitals and Surgery Centers

When many people think of healthcare administration, they picture major facilities such as hospitals. This impression is, to an extent, accurate: data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) indicates that a full 30 percent of medical and health services managers work in state, local or private hospitals.

Within these larger facilities, health admin employees may enjoy numerous opportunities to specialize, often in niche areas such as insurance claims, medical records or patient access. Major facilities also tend to provide more opportunities for advancement, particularly among healthcare administrators with graduate-level degrees.

Medical Laboratories

Staffed by teams of medical technologists, clinical laboratories provide testing services for patient specimens. While these labs can sometimes be found within hospitals, they may also consist of separate facilities situated nearby.

Medical labs may be government or privately owned, with many focusing primarily on a specific type of test or clinical specialty. Examples include hematology, transfusion medicine and public health. Effective administration keeps these labs as safe, secure and efficient as possible.

Physician Offices

Physician office operations are far more complex than most patients realize. They are also a far more significant employer of health administration professionals than typically assumed. According to the BLS, these small facilities account for over one in ten medical and health services management jobs.

Like larger facilities, small practices call for extensive oversight. At this level, failures in administration can snowball, causing far more significant problems that prove not only costly for patients and healthcare providers but also potentially dangerous. There may be some need for specialization, but it is also common for practice-based administrators to take on a wide variety of tasks.

Outpatient and Nursing Care Facilities

From nursing homes to assisted living and long-term care facilities, a variety of environments facilitate the safe and enjoyable livelihoods of long-term residents who may deal with a range of complex — and often chronic — health concerns.

A variety of clinical workers provide services within these spaces, including nurses, nursing assistants and physical or occupational therapists. They are accompanied by health administrators, who may act as liaisons between patients and other healthcare workers.

Long-term care administrators also navigate the intricate interplay of clinical and residential concerns that is unique to this setting. Additionally, health administrators are called on to oversee complex insurance and billing requirements while promoting the long-term financial viability of the facility.

Entry-Level Health Administration Jobs

If you like the idea of working in health administration and want to prepare for success in this promising field, the first step is simple: enroll in a health administration degree program. There are many options available, however, so you will want to choose carefully to maximize your career potential.

A relevant associate degree is the absolute minimum barrier to entry into health administration — but this will only get you so far. Typically, the Bachelor of Science in Healthcare Administration is the preferred option for impressing potential employers. With this widely respected degree, you will find that a vast range of compelling job opportunities become available, along with the potential to advance your career as you gain experience and additional credentials.

To illustrate the vast scope of this field, we’ve highlighted several examples of entry-level health administration positions below:

Medical Records Technician

Medical records play a vital role in conveying and tracking sensitive healthcare information. These resources are safeguarded by a myriad of complex rules and regulations. They are also influenced by increasingly advanced technological systems designed to improve security while ensuring that clinical professionals can gain access to vital information when and where they need it.

Medical records technician jobs are among the most accessible to recent healthcare admin graduates. These positions are plentiful, often lead to excellent opportunities for advancement and can be found in every area of healthcare admin, including environments such as clinics and hospitals, along with nursing homes, outpatient facilities and many other locations. Some technicians and processing specialists are even able to work on a remote basis.

Patient Services Coordinator

Interactions with clinical staff members only represent a small part of what makes a patient’s experience comfortable and satisfactory. Patient services coordinators ensure that all kinds of patient needs are met, often by acting as a liaison between patients and the employees charged with providing clinical care.

Sometimes referred to as patient care coordinators, these hardworking and highly compassionate professionals go to great lengths to determine what patients need and how these requests can be fulfilled. They must accomplish all this while also abiding by overarching regulations or healthcare best practices.

Insurance Claims Analyst

Patients almost universally dread dealing with insurance, but this could be a lot more complicated and time-consuming without the hard work of insurance claims analysts. These underappreciated administrative professionals are responsible for organizing, filing and updating medical claims while promoting both streamlined and accurate workflows.

While some claims analysts are directly employed by clinics or other facilities, it’s increasingly common for dedicated management firms to handle these tasks. No matter how or where claims are processed, the health admin professionals involved play a critical role in keeping patients aware of their financial obligations while promoting the economic viability of facilities and healthcare systems.

Healthcare Consultant

Consulting is an increasingly popular path for those who are passionate about health administration but desire more flexibility and autonomy than traditional entry-level jobs provide. These opportunities are available in every health administration niche imaginable, ranging from insurance claims to patient care coordination and beyond.

Health administration consultants provide a valuable outside perspective, often highlighting or addressing issues that would have otherwise gone unnoticed or unresolved. Some are self-employed or run their own businesses, while others prefer the increased stability and security that come with working for a dedicated consulting firm.

Master of Health Administration Jobs

If you hope to climb the career ladder and move into mid or high-level health administration positions, a master’s degree is a must.

Some students prefer to secure this after working a few years in the field, while others enroll in graduate programs as soon as they obtain their bachelor’s. Some even get the chance to participate in 4+1 programs and quickly make progress toward both bachelor’s and master’s degrees. Either way, this prestigious degree will prepare you to seek challenging yet fulfilling work in a variety of areas:

Director of Managed Care

Managed care aims to improve patient outcomes and satisfaction while reducing costs for patients and healthcare organizations alike. The director of managed care oversees a wide range of processes and initiatives while determining which solutions are most impactful and where further improvements may be required.

Innovation is often a strong focus in managed care, where high-level professionals implement cutting-edge, research-backed initiatives to improve patient outcomes. Continuous evaluations are essential for new initiatives — and to reveal whether standard processes and workflows contribute toward the overarching goals of boosting patient care while reducing costs.

Clinical Manager/Supervisor

As a core part of everyday operations in today’s hospitals and outpatient facilities, clinical managers and supervisors are responsible for a wide range of administrative tasks — and that includes overseeing employees from numerous departments.

Recruitment and onboarding are some of the most vital responsibilities, although clinical managers may also play a significant role in developing facility-wide missions and visions. This is a popular path for health administrators with a clinical background, as it allows them to put a unique blend of clinical, administrative and leadership skills to good use.

Nursing Home Administrator

As we’ve discussed, nursing homes and other residential care facilities are just as in need of strong healthcare administrators as the hospitals and specialty clinics with which these professionals are typically associated.

In the extended care setting, health administrators set the stage for excellent health outcomes and significant cost savings. Beyond this, they promote a positive experience for residential patients, who may call these facilities home for months or even years.

At the management level, these administrators are often in charge of staffing concerns, including recruitment, onboarding and evaluation. They may also be highly involved in payroll, billing and compliance. Many work closely with governing bodies to ensure that policies are appropriately implemented and carried out.

Health Information Manager

Charged with safeguarding sensitive patient information, health information managers (HIMs) are heavily involved in the acquisition and analysis of medical data. They provide a powerful link between clinicians, information technology professionals and many other stakeholders.

Audits are a critical part of this practice, as they can reveal whether current tools, technologies and processes are in full compliance with federal regulations and industry best practices.

Technically speaking, some of the jobs we have already mentioned fall into the category of health information management. Medical records technicians, for example, are tasked with keeping patient information accurate and secure. HIMs oversee these and many other entry-level employees to ensure that the entirety of the facility or system’s day-to-day health information operations run smoothly and according to strict privacy regulations.

Practice Administrator

Often employed by doctor’s offices or other small clinics, practice administrators can be just as influential as the many health administrators who work in larger facilities.

These jacks-of-all-trades are responsible for a wide range of administrative concerns, such as recruitment, onboarding, budgeting, compliance and more. To ensure these operations run smoothly, practice administrators develop and implement research-backed policies and procedures. Many work closely with executives to align daily facility operations with long-term organizational objectives.

This position is common in smaller facilities but also exists within some larger hospitals or surgery centers, where administrators may need to oversee a variety of departments and all types of administrative professionals.

Your Story Starts Here

At Park University, we offer many degree programs that appeal to aspiring health administrators. These include the Bachelor of Science in Healthcare Administration and the Master of Healthcare Administration. Both programs provide numerous opportunities to specialize in essential areas such as marketing, project management or business analytics.

If you are just getting started but have ambitious goals for the future, our 4+1 program can streamline your path to your dream career. Under this unique setup, you can make swift progress toward obtaining your bachelor’s and master’s degrees.

Ready to learn more? Reach out today to get the details on our various healthcare admin programs — and to discover the role they could play in preparing you for a rewarding and impactful career in the healthcare sector.