Course Objective

The student:
• acquires knowledge of diverse systems of health care;
• acquires knowledge of factors influencing costs of health care;
• acquires knowledge of strategies of cost containment;
• acquires knowledge of theory and methodology of cost
effectiveness assessment;
• acquires knowledge of theories of justice in health care;
• acquires knowledge of strategies for public participation in
health policy making;
• acquires insight into the ethical dilemmas in health care policy;
• acquires insight into the ways these dilemmas have been and can
be dealt with;
• acquires competence in identification of the ethical dimensions
of health care policies;
• acquires competence in introducing ethical principles in
discussions about health care
policy;
• acquires competence in distinguishing substantive and procedural
justice issues;
• acquires competence in assessing the quality of cure and care;
• acquires competence in involving the public in health care policy
decisions.

Course Content

The course deals with 4 themes. The first is the system of health care.
There are several systems of health care in Europe and worldwide that
differ in the roles allocated to state, health care providers, health
insurance companies, and patients (organizations). What are the
strengths and weakness of the systems? The second theme is costs and
quality of cure and care. Both cost containment and quality of cure and
care are important goals of health care policy. How can they be
promoted? Can they be combined? With this the third theme, the ethical
point of view in health care policy, comes to the fore. Which ethical
principles should guide the distribution of scarce resources in health
care? The fourth theme is participation of the public in policy making.
Is that desirable? How should it be done?

Teaching Methods

The course will be given in the form of lectures; study of literature;
assignments; group discussion; simulation meeting advisory committee
standard package health care; training quality policy and
implementation; training interactive development of healthcare policy.

Method of Assessment

Assignment(s) during the course (30% of the final mark) and final paper
at the end of the course (1500-2000 words; 70% of the final mark).

Literature

Literature will be specified in the course manual and on Canvas and
will be distributed, if possible, via Canvas too.