Semester
n/a
Year offered
2018
Global Health Informatics is a growing multi-disciplinary field that combines research methods and applications of technology to improve health care systems and outcomes. Health care systems a facing many challenges including a growing population, the increasing complexity of care services, and limited resources to deliver services. These challenges will require more innovative approaches to scale health care services to larger numbers of people. Health Informatics can be defined as the acquiring, storing, retrieving and using of healthcare information to foster better collaboration among a patient's various health care providers. Another definition cited by the National Library of Medicine defines health informatics “the interdisciplinary study of the design, development, adoption and application of IT-based innovations in healthcare services delivery, management, and planning” (NML 2016). The term e-health can be defined as "the cost-effective and secure use of information and communications technologies in support of health and health-related fields, including healthcare services, health surveillance, health literature, and health education, knowledge and research” (WHO 2005). Increasing health informatics is a fundamental requirement for building effective and efficient health information systems at local, national, and global levels. This course presents an overview of approaches to health informatics in different countries and the unique challenges faced in diverse settings.
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