The Medical Faculty Associates restructured its relationship with the University Friday to give GW more administrative responsibilities.

GW will now have rights to appoint board members and approve the MFA’s CEO, annual budget, amendments to the organization’s bylaws and “significant affiliations and business relationships,” according to a University release Friday.

The MFA is a nonprofit organization separate from the University, and it will maintain its independence under the new structure. Physicians will remain employees of the MFA, and the organization’s board will remain intact “with substantial autonomy,” the release states.

“This new structure will help the University stabilize the MFA financially and more strategically align the clinical and academic missions,” University President Thomas LeBlanc said in the release.

LeBlanc named strengthening the relationship between branches of GW’s medical enterprise – which consists of the School of Medicine and Health Sciences, the Medical Faculty Associates and GW Hospital – as one of his top five priorities earlier this year.

The Board of Trustees previously had a committee dedicated to medical and clinical partnerships, but the group stopped meeting this summer as administrators took over responsibility for overseeing the medical enterprise.