Education
The department of Health Services Research (HSR) participates in particular in three education programmes.
MASTER: Healthcare Policy, Innovation and Management
Never has the need for innovation in healthcare been greater than today. Consumer demands and expectations are rising. Ageing and the advancement of new medical options have led to a growth in healthcare expenditures. Healthcare Policy, Innovation and Management offers a multidisciplinary approach and brings together both theory and practice in its focus on innovation. And it does so on all possible levels, from micro-to-macro-level, from individual organisations to national healthcare systems, from patient relations to the process of caretaking.
Influencing the future of healthcare: innovation
Across Europe, healthcare has become one of the biggest employment sectors. State involvement in healthcare features an unprecedented growth. These developments raise fundamental questions, such as:
- how to organise and implement patient-oriented healthcare,
- how to guarantee universal access to a fair package of health services,
- how to provide high-quality healthcare while containing costs,
- how to improve the performance of healthcare systems in general and healthcare providers in particular.
Key to all these issues is the need for innovation. The Healthcare Policy, Innovation and Management programme will therefore give you solid insight into aspects of healthcare innovation at all levels. It will provide you with the competences needed to play a key role in initiating, governing, evaluating and managing healthcare innovations. And it will give you the ability to critically analyse health systems, to translate the results into innovative solutions and to influence the future of healthcare.
![UM picture library](/sites/default/files/styles/780x520/public/2023-03/2009jvcd3um_healthcare_20.jpg?itok=LHDiSsns)
BACHELOR 2nd year: Policy, Management and Evaluation of Health Care
You begin to specialise in the second year of your studies by choosing one of the four tracks. Your choice should be based not only on your interests, but also on the master’s programme you intend to follow and your career plans. The study advisors of the faculty can help you make an appropriate choice.
During the Policy, Management and Evaluation of Health Care track, you learn how to get to the bottom of complex connections in health care. You learn how health care is organised, which (future) care issues need to be solved and how you can contribute as a health scientist.
Examples of questions that get addressed are:
- What forms of formal and informal care do patients come into contact with?
- How is healthcare financed and organized in the Netherlands (and in other countries)?
- What is the quality of health care and how can it be improved?
- How can entrepreneurship lead to effective innovations and how can they be implemented?
You approach these issues from research; you learn different research methods for this and study articles. In addition, practical contacts have been planned, which means that you also come into contact with patients, healthcare professionals, managers, administrators, policy makers and insurers.
![UM picture turorial group](/sites/default/files/styles/780x520/public/2023-03/7215-07_gw.onderwijsgroepturtor.jpg?h=8f943aef&itok=MOF6TI5V)
BACHELOR 2nd year: Digital Technology and Care
You begin to specialise in the second year of your studies by choosing one of the four tracks. Your choice should be based not only on your interests, but also on the master’s programme you intend to follow and your career plans. The study advisors of the faculty can help you make an appropriate choice.
Technological developments transform healthcare: from applications such as eHealth, robotics, smart home devices, Internet of Things to management information systems.
These new technological developments not only change the quality of care for patients but also change the daily work of healthcare professionals. However, the successful implementation of these applications doesn’t go without a struggle. Often, the people who invent and develop technology are not the ones who are going to use it every day. Since future technological innovations are going to keep transforming healthcare, we need to ‘close the gap’ between IT specialist and technology developers and healthcare. We are in need of ‘linking pins’!
Within the Digital Technology and Care specialisation, you will study the following topics at an academic level:
- How can we limit the gap between the worlds of IT and healthcare?
- What is the impact of eHealth applications in and outside healthcare organisations?
- How can technological innovations be implemented to improve quality of care?
- How do you ensure that healthcare organisations are ‘innovation ready’ regarding technological innovations?
- What role do Artificial Intelligence, Big Data and Datascience play in future healthcare?
- What role does ethics play regarding technology in healthcare?
- What does the constant development of technology entail for our society and our healthcare?
In your future career, you are the 'linking pin' - the bridge builder - who on the one hand understands where current and future challenges lie in healthcare, and on the other hand can propose, (co)develop, implement and evaluate technological solutions and possibilities to address these challenges. The question that you will always keep in mind is therefore: "How can the development and implementation of new technological innovations improve the quality of healthcare and what is needed to achieve this?"
![UM picture digital technology](/sites/default/files/styles/780x520/public/2023-03/7138-07_gw.computerlandschap.jpg?h=e1711960&itok=qB9leT04)