Advancements in awareness and understanding have led to greater equity and inclusion in society for people with disabilities. Developments such as the establishment of Disability Studies as an interdisciplinary field in the 1980’s and the introduction of the Americans with Disabilities Act (“ADA”) in 1990 are key milestones in this journey. However, these achievements alone do not guarantee the extent of attitudinal and behavioral change needed within our communities and organizations to remove the barriers and prejudices that remain.

This course focuses on questions of mission and vision ("How does managed care support the triple aim of US healthcare: improving the patient experience, improving population health, and reducing per capita cost?”) and on questions of strategy and operations ("How can public health professionals successfully adopt and leverage managed care business models to improve affordable, sustainable access to high quality care?”).

The Realities of Managing Complex Health Systems course is designed to provide students with an up close perspective of how large health systems operate. Using real life case studies, expert insight, and relevant reading materials the course will outline the problems, issues, and possible solutions for essential areas of management, operations, and finance such as:

This course aims to improve your ability to effectively manage and lead health service organizations.  We examine a range of key challenges that managers must address to optimize organizational performance, including questions of mission, vision, and strategy ("What areas or activities should we be working in?") and questions of organizational design and operations ("How can we perform effectively in this area?").

The goal of this course is to prepare you for the challenges and organization transformation required in a value-based payment world.   Managers will need not only an understanding of the total patient view, care integration and population risk management techniques required to meet new reimbursement requirements, but the change management issues and the IT/data management infrastructure and reporting environment required for success.  This course outlines the issues and challenges from all stakeholder perspectives: payors and plan sponsors, healthcare system managers, clinicians, IT depart

Whether you are a founder or working for a founder, you are an innovator and an entrepreneur. The Making of a Healthcare Entrepreneur is the course for current and future health care innovators interested in learning how to exploit gaps and opportunities in the evolving healthcare industry and launch meaningful, valuable companies as measured by customers and investors. It provides innovators with the essential steps needed to take their idea from concept to reality.

The goal of this course is to prepare you for the challenges and organization transformation required in a value-based payment world. Managers will need not only an understanding of the total patient view, care integration and population risk management techniques required to meet new reimbursement requirements, but the change management issues and the IT/data management infrastructure and reporting environment required for success.

All public and nonprofit organizations must assemble and report information on their performance. The need for performance measures goes beyond legal and regulatory requirements. To provide services effectively and efficiently, managers need information to make decisions. This course focuses on what performance measures are needed, how they should be created and what forms of communication are most effective.

This course explores the legal, policy and ethical issues encountered by health care professionals in the continuously evolving health care system. Topics will include government regulation of health care providers, patient consent to and refusal of treatment, human reproduction issues, privacy and confidentiality, tax-exemption, antitrust, fraud and abuse, mental health issues and health information management. Students will gain the ability to analyze legal and ethical health care resources by engaging in interactive discussions and informative research. 

This course is an introduction to major health policy issues and examines the role of government in the health care system. An important focus of the course is an assessment of the role of policy analysis in the formation and implementation of national and local health policy. Because much of government health policy relates to or is implemented through payment systems, emphasis will be placed on the discussion of the policy implications of how government pays for care.

We tend to be ethnocentric in our views of health care organization and policy. A look abroad, however, can provide insights about problems at home. In spite of differences in the organization and financing of their health care systems, most countries share a number of common problems with the United States. First, is the question of deciding - or not explicitly deciding - what proportion of GNP should be devoted to health and welfare. Second, is the problem of agreeing on appropriate criteria to allocate health and social service expenditures.

The Wagner School Summer Institute brings together faculty and students from the United States and other parts of the world for an on-site exploration of international health policy and prospects in Geneva, Switzerland.