M.S. in Health Informatics

M.S. in Health Informatics Program Information

Available online at Franklin University .

Students in the Master of Science in Health Informatics will focus on the integration of data, technology, and policy that forms the cornerstone of healthcare delivery, research, and development; the skills to turn the ever-increasing amount of patient data into knowledge that improves lives. They will also critically examine how legal and regulatory requirements, reimbursement model changes, and consumer empowerment effect measureable patient outcomes generated through data analysis. The student will develop a multi-disciplinary approach to implementing and sustaining health informatics needs of an organization through project management, information governance, and supporting human factors.

Curriculum & Course Descriptions

32 Semester Hours
Major Area Required
MATH 601 - Introduction to Analytics (4)

This course provides an introductory overview of methods, concepts, and current practices in the growing field of statistics and data analytics. Topics to be covered include data collection, data analysis and visualization as well as probability, statistical inference and regression methods for informed decision-making. Students will explore these topics with current statistical software. Some emphasis will also be given to ethical principles of data analytics.

DATA 605 - Data Visualization & Reporting (4)

This course focuses on collecting, preparing, and analyzing data to create visualizations, dashboards, and stories that can be used to communicate critical business insights. Students will learn how to structure and streamline data analysis projects and highlight their implications efficiently using the most popular visualization tools used by businesses today.

DATA 610 - Big Data Analytics and Data Mining (4)

This course explores data mining methods and tools, examines the issues in the analytical analysis of massive datasets, and unstructured data. Students will learn the concepts and techniques to discover the patterns in large datasets, which support organizational decision making.

HIM 702 - Health Information Governance (4)

This course covers the broad spectrum of strategic issues in healthcare including policies, guidelines, standards, processes, and controls required to manage and implement enterprise-level information. Treating information as a strategic asset to healthcare organizations, processes to manage various risks to the quality of information and ensure its appropriate use are covered.

HIM 710 - Clinical Workflow & Applications (4)

This course explores requirements for clinical workflows in a variety of inpatient, outpatient, and emergency healthcare environments. It covers the documentation, review, mapping, and diagramming of clinical workflow information and processes. The course also covers the linkages between the improvement of patient care to workflow mapping and change management, as part of evidence based decision making in healthcare.

HIM 761 - Healthcare Analytics (4)

This course addresses the process of retrieving, analyzing, and reporting intelligence to make healthcare decisions. It covers the techniques of extracting, transforming and loading data from a myriad of operational databases into corporate data warehouses, as well means to ensure that decision making is based on clean and reliable information. The course also includes ways to report the healthcare intelligence gathered.

HCM 772 - Healthcare Strategic Management (4)

The student will examine principles of strategic management applied to healthcare organizations. This Capstone course through critical assessments of the real world environment and case studies on strategy formulation, implementation, and evaluation will examine alternative strategic frameworks for healthcare organizations. Topics will include, mission, vision statement development, environmental assessments, analysis of strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats, use of critical success factors, development of business plans, and other techniques for strategic planning and management.

DATA 630 - Applied Database Management (4)

This course teaches data management from an applied perspective. The topics include fundamentals of database management systems, structured query language (SQL) for data analytics, relational database design, and data warehousing.

Optional Focus Areas

At least 2 of the following courses:

Healthcare Administration

HCM 733 - Finance and Managerial Accounting in Healthcare Organizations (4)

The purpose of this course is to provide students with the fundamental concepts and calculations associated with financial accounting and managerial accounting within a healthcare organization. Students will study the foundational aspects of financial accounting with a primary focus on financial statements and the uses of the information in these statements. Students will also study the functional aspects of managerial accounting to include cost behavior, cost allocation, pricing, planning, budgeting, profit analysis, and performance evaluation. Application of these concepts will include analysis of case studies.

HCM 735 - Healthcare Delivery Systems (4)

The course provides an extensive overview of leadership in the U.S. health services system. The focus of the course will be on the role health services leadership plays in the delivery of healthcare services, to include managing with professionals, financial management, services utilization, and other aspects of the U.S. healthcare system. The student will explore the key theoretical and practical elements of leadership as well as current issues clarifying how the U.S. health services system is organized, managed, and financed.

HCM 742 - Healthcare Laws and Ethics (4)

In this course students will develop a strong foundation in health law, enabling them to deal with the common legal, practical, moral, and ethical issues that healthcare organizations face on a daily basis. Topics will include statutory law, rules and regulations, tort law, criminal law, contract law, civil procedures, and trial procedure.

HCM 752 - Health Policy (4)

This course will explore the essential conceptual and analytical understanding of health policymaking and politics, including their impact on health administration and leadership. Selected policy issues will be explored through the application of political concepts and behavioral models, including a system model of policymaking. The emphasis will be on understanding the health leader’s approach to the policymaking system, become involved in it, and work through it to attain their objectives and those of their organization.

HCM 765 - Healthcare Operations Management (4)

Students will explore concepts and theories of operations management. The student will develop both knowledge and skills in solving the operational problems of healthcare organizations. This course will examine process improvement models that are aimed at improving the safety and quality of healthcare delivery within an organization.