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| FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS [FAQs]  Please browse through our list of Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs), or contact us for additional information.
Q: What are the goals of iMBA, Inc?
Our goals are to support financial and economic advisors and help medical professionals survive and flourish as profitable personal and business entities. Unfortunately, managed care and financial industry consolidation has taken its toll on these two professions. We will help reverse this trend by empowering financial advisors through our comprehensive CERTIFIED MEDICAL PLANNER™ on-line program, educational products, textbooks, seminars, tools and other state-of-the-art future products and services.
Q: To whom is the first duty of a CERTIFIED MEDICAL PLANNER™?
Our prime duty and responsibility, as a fiduciary, is to our medical colleagues. This is a natural consequence of being founded by doctors, managed by doctors, and serving doctors. Our second duty is to our financial CERTIFIED MEDICAL PLANNER™ colleagues. This is a natural consequence of our dual degreed executive management team. It also promotes impartiality and a lack of bias.
Q: Is it true that doctors make difficult clients?
This opinion is unfortunately correct in some instances. It is more common with brokerage firms or "non-fiduciary advisors" willing to take on any doctor client. However, we have not found it to be the case with iMBA, Inc. Perhaps it is because we carefully pre-screen both financial advisors and doctors prior to any engagement? We want a successful CERTIFIED MEDICAL PLANNER™ match, as we seek to bring together the right advisors for each particular doctor's unique set of circumstances. This is the only way complex problems are solved, and optimal solutions obtained.
Q: Where are iMBA, Inc. textbooks, comments, whitepapers, opinions, or essays mentioned in the financial and/ or medical and healthcare literature?
In, Managed Care Executive, Healthcare Informatics, Medical Interface, Plastic Surgery Products, Teaching and Learning in Medicine, Orthodontics Today, Chiropractic Products, Podiatry Today, Podiatry Management, Physician's Money Digest, and the Journal of the American Medical Association, among others.
And, by academic institutions like the Northern University College of Business, Creighton University, UCLA School of Medicine, Medical College of Wisconsin, Washington University School of Medicine, University of North Texas Health Science Center, University of Pennsylvania Medical and Dental Libraries, Southern Illinois College of Medicine, University at Buffalo Health Sciences Library, Temple University [School of Medicine, Dentistry and Podiatric Medicine], University of Michigan Dental Library, University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, Thomas Jefferson University and Jefferson Medical College, Emory University School of Medicine, and the Goizueta School of Business at Emory University, among others.
iMBA and CERTIFIED MEDICAL PLANNER™ authors have also been referenced or mentioned in financial trade publications like: Investment Advisor Magazine, Registered Representative, Financial Advisor Magazine and the Journal of Financial Planning. And, in health economics and financial trade organizations like the Medical Group Management Association (MGMA), American College of Medical Practice Executives (ACMPE), American College of Physician Executives (ACPE), American College of Emergency Physicians (ACEP), Health Care Management Associates (HMA), and Physicians Practice.com
Q: What other educational resources does iMBA provide?
iMBA Inc., provides high quality on-line information, and on-site educational platforms, to financial advisors who represent medical providers, healthcare executives, hospitals and medical institutions. Our professional-level publications offer Celebrity Forewords written by industry luminaries like: Anthony Silva, MD, MBA from the Emory University Goizueta School of Business; or Frank Cappiello MBA, of Wall $treet Week with Louis Rukeyser TV fame; or Ahmad Hashem, MD PhD of Microsoft’s Healthcare Industry Solutions Group; or Lloyd M. Krieger, MD, MBA of UCLA and Rodeo Drive Plastic Surgery; or Richard D. Helppie, CEO and Founder of the Superior Consultant Company (SUPC-NASD); or Robert James Cimasi, MHA, ASA, AVA, CBA, FCBI, Certified Medical Planner, Chairman of Health Capital Consultants, LLC; or Edwin P. Morrow, CLU, ChFC, RFC, CFP often considered a father of the financial planning profession; or Michael J. Stahl, PhD, Director, Physician Executive MBA Program, William B. Stokely Distinguished Professor of Business, College of Business Administration The University of Tennessee; or Thomas E. Getzen, PhD, Executive Director, International Health Economics Association (iHEA), Professor of Risk, Insurance and Healthcare Management, The Fox School of Business at Temple University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA.
And, our CERTIFIED MEDICAL PLANNER™ professional designation program is slowly becoming a leading imprimatur in the healthcare industry. iMBA also maintains lively inter-professional debate with discussion forums, opinion surveys and referral services. In brief, we educate and support consultants who advise physicians and healthcare clients, about the financial, business, managerial and economic matters vital to their success.
Q: What is the iMBA educational philosophy of heutagogy and andragogy?
These are online adult-learning principles that are distinct from traditional teacher-led pedagogy. They involve mutual respect from informed learners and live instructors in the asynchronous iMBA Virtual University environment. It is a Socratic method of "anytime and anywhere" conversational education, using solutions based processing rather than rote memorization, or extreme testing psychometrics.
Q: What is my tuition investment in this prestigious Certified Medical Planner™ program?
Tuition represents a modest investment of $5,999 USD, payable in four easy semester installments of $1,500. Books are extra, and there is a non-refundable application fee of $250 USD, for due-diligence and background investigation. There are no additional fees for tools, templates and/or .pdf files. A biannual CEU approved-publication requirement is in-force.
Q: Are tuition, books, and expenses, etc., tax deductible?
Yes, there are three options for claiming expenses for the CERTIFIED MEDICAL PLANNER™ charter designation. Work-related educational expenses can be itemized and deducted on Form 1040; taken as a "tuition and fees deduction," or taken as a lifetime learning credit. According to the IRS, "a tax credit reduces the amount of income tax you may have to pay. Unlike a deduction, which reduces the amount of income subject to tax, a credit directly reduces the tax itself." So what matters to the IRS isn't whether or not the Certified Medical Planner qualifies you for a new trade or business, but which option you choose (credit or deduction) when filing. If the expenses are claimed as a credit, they cannot also be deducted as a business expense, and the rules are different for each option. We suggest checking with your tax adviser or CPA to determine which route is more appropriate before trying to take a credit or a deduction [IRS Publication #17].
Q: Do I earn any other "value-added" benefits from the Certified Medical Planner™ program?
We think so! Harvard economist Caroline Hoxby, who specializes in the economics of education, figures that those who enter a top-tier private college earn more than those who do not. And, like the CERTIFIED MEDICAL PLANNER™ program, elite professional designation programs attract elite adult-learners. She also figures that student aptitude accounts for between two-thirds and three-quarters of the earnings difference between public and private schools; yet even allowing for this, it pays to go to the most selective college possible. "People who invest in education at a more selective college generally earn back their investment several times over during their careers," What's more, she says, "the returns to attending a more-selective college have been rising over time," and the career-long income differences "swamp the differences in the total costs of attending less-selective public colleges." We believe the same can be said for the CERTIFIED MEDICAL PLANNER™ online professional designation program; and only time will tell.
Q: Do I have to be a fiduciary to become a CERTIFIED MEDICAL PLANNER™ charter-holder?
Yes, independent minded Certified Medical Planner™ advisors take pride in their fiduciary responsibility. Such accountability is higher than a broker’s mere “suitability” requirements, which amazingly do not mitigate conflict-of-interest disclosures, among other things. There is an iMBA, Inc. ethics requirement and we mandate a written ethics attestation statement prior to matriculation. What do you think about the new era of health economics?
How about the philosophy of physician-focused financial planning integrated with medical management consulting? Q: Feel free to call, email or fax-in any additional queries about our CMP program; and consider the following? Do you want to become a CERTIFIED MEDICAL PLANNER™? and Why? Are you a potential Certified Medical Planner™ prospect? Do you want to be a fiduciary for medical clients, and physicians? Are you interested in a new career; or career extension? Are our books, whitepapers, CDs and Knowledge Center™ credible? Do you own them, and what do you like or dislike about them? Why did you commence Certified Medical Planner™ matriculation? Why won't you commence Certified Medical Planner™ matriculation? Is the CERTIFIED MEDICL PLANNER™ program tough in rigor? Does it really take 500 hours, throughout one full year and 4 semesters? Did you complete the entire course? Why or why not? Are the new CERTIFIED MEDICAL PLANNER™ marks, valid? Are you interested in client referrals, writing or speaking engagements? Are you a potential CERTIFIED MEDICAL PLANNER™ sponsor partner? What do you think of on-ground CMP™ education as a RIA or BD? Must you be a CFP™, CPA, CLU, CFA, MBA, RIA, or RR to matriculate? Have you had prior experience with adult-learning, or distance-education? What are Certified Medical Planner™ instructors like? Is there much homework and reading? How about tests, papers or course work? etc, etc.
Raising the Bar
CERTIFIED MEDICAL PLANNER™
The informed voice of a new generation of fiduciary advisors for healthcare™
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