Course Introduction

This online education portal has been envisaged to be pivotal in enhancing the knowledge and skills of health professionals by strengthening their capacity to implement activities and services in the field of public health using principles of health economics. These courses will cater to the needs of health care professionals such as public health managers, social scientists and other development managers.

Background

Having the requisite knowledge and skills of health economics, public health managers can bring about a significant change in performance of the health system. They can better advocate for allocation of resources for health. Secondly, ‘financing’ has now been recognized as an important function of the health system. An in-depth understanding of how to generate resources, how to pool funds, how to purchase services from health providers, how to pay providers of health care, and how to finally deliver health services will affect how the health function delivers on the two important tenets of economic outcomes, i.e. efficiency and equity.

Having organized a health system on a specific financing and delivery model, health care managers are provided with a finite set of resources to deliver services. Herein, the principles of efficiency become important to answer some key issues. Where to invest, and how to invest resources are questions which involve an understanding of the principles of health economics. How to cost for health services? How do we measure the benefits of health care interventions? How to make these valuations of benefits, comparable across programs so as to answer allocative efficiency questions? These and many other questions are answered and understood through applications of methodologies introduced in health economics.

Why is it important

The online course approach for capacity development is particularly suitable for early and mid-career professionals who have work commitments, and at the same time yearn to learn more and build their skill-set. It involves an educational component which will utilize teaching aids (online lectures) to convey information and build skills and job aids (manual) that the participant can refer to in the absence of any technical assistance. Through its network, it provides information far and wide with the click of a mouse, irrespective of the geographical location of the delivery point.

The ultimate aim is to improve the health of populations, communities and particular groups within them, through utilization of economic principles in promotion of health and prevention of diseases; and the provision and evaluation of treatment and care. The emphasis is on the understanding, use, and critical evaluation of conceptual frameworks in health economics for improving health systems; understanding the methods for analyzing health programs and policies from an economic perspective; and utilizing the evidence for making policies and programs which provide best value for money.

Health Economics Courses offered