Intro to Finance in Healthcare (Coursera)

Intro to Finance in Healthcare (Coursera)

This course is best suited for individuals currently in the healthcare sector, as a provider, payer, or administrator. Individuals pursuing a career change to the healthcare sector may also be interested in this course. In this course, you will have an opportunity to explore concepts and topics related to accounting and finance basics for healthcare organizations.

Class Deals by MOOC List - Click here and see Coursera's Active Discounts, Deals, and Promo Codes.

After an introduction to the financial statements of healthcare entities, you will then learn how to read, interpret, and use a financial statement in order to understand the financial health of an organization. Your attention will be primarily focused on the Balance Sheet and Income Statement and basics surrounding revenue and expenses.
This course will tie together the financial elements learned, to the risks facing healthcare entities, as the industry continues to evolve from the COVID 19 pandemic and its resulting impact on labor, supply chain expenses, and value-based care reimbursement models. Throughout this course, you will be given the opportunity to evaluate your understanding through engagement in course discussions, application of course concepts to a course assignment, and through completion of content quizzes along the way.

What You Will Learn

  • Demonstrate an ability to read and understand key data communicated in a company’s financial statements
  • Recognize the key elements that make up a balance sheet, income statement and statement of cash flows by recognizing revenue and expenses.
  • Develop knowledge of how budgets work with financial statements to create a fuller understanding of the financial condition of a company.

Syllabus

WEEK 1
Overview of Health Market Actors
In this module, we will explore the complexity of the healthcare industry by learning about the various actors involved. The healthcare industry is diverse and made up of government, providers, health plans, employers, and the pharmaceutical industry. Understanding the role of each actor and the factors that drive the cost of healthcare is essential for patients, healthcare providers, and other stakeholders in the industry.

WEEK 2
Overview of Financial Statements
Financial statements are crucial documents that are used to provide information about a company's financial performance and position. The 5 main financial statements are: Management Discussion & Analysis, Balance Sheet, Income Statement, Statement of Cash Flows, and Notes to financial statements. The financial statements are critical tools that provide valuable insights into a company's financial performance and position. In this module, we will explore these statements in greater detail and discuss the importance of these documents.

WEEK 3
Revenue
Healthcare providers play a crucial role in ensuring that patients receive quality care while also generating revenue. The healthcare industry is divided into three primary market segments - commercial, Medicare, and Medicaid - each with its own reimbursement rate. In this module, you will explore these market segments in closer detail. You will also compare various reimbursement models used to pay doctors and hospitals - including capitation.

WEEK 4
Expenses
Expense management is also a critical component of the healthcare industry as expenses in an income statement represent the costs of doing business. These expenses must be closely monitored to ensure the financial stability of healthcare providers. In this module, you will review the major expense categories that are reported in the income statement and identify fixed and variable expenses. You will also explore depreciation expense, differentiate it from other expense line items, and reflect on its relationship to the balance sheet. Finally, you will contrast operating and non-operating income and the differences between net income and cash flow.

Go to Class
MOOC List is learner-supported. When you buy through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.

Related Courses

Financial Reporting Capstone (Coursera) Coursera
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Financial Reporting Capstone (Coursera)

The Capstone is the culminating project in the Financial Reporting Specialization. You will have the opportunity to combine the concepts and techniques obtained through all the courses in this specialization (Accounting Analysis I: The Role of Accounting as an Information System, Accounting Analysis I: Measurement and Disclosure of Assets, Accounting Analysis II: Measurement and Disclosure of Liabilities, and Accounting Analysis II: Accounting for Liabilities and Equity) and apply them to a real world accounting project.

Nov 2nd 2026
3 Weeks
Breastfeeding: Public Health Perspectives (Coursera) Coursera
University of Michigan

Breastfeeding: Public Health Perspectives (Coursera)

Engaging in this course will provide you with the opportunity to think about breastfeeding and its public health implications. The Socio-Ecological Model will be the framework of the course as we think about how each level of the Model (individual, interpersonal, community, organizational, and public policy) impacts breastfeeding practices in the United States, and globally.

Oct 26th 2026
4 Weeks
Global Quality Maternal and Newborn Care (Coursera) Coursera
Yale University

Global Quality Maternal and Newborn Care (Coursera)

This course is designed for administrators, advocates, policy makers, clinicians, and service users. It will give you the background, recommendations, and tools you need to address issues related to high quality maternal and newborn care in your own setting. In particular, you will learn about the evidence behind implementing the midwifery model of care as a means to advancing the health and wellbeing of mothers and babies globally. The modules in this course are structured around the Quality Maternal and Newborn Care Framework, first published in the landmark 2014 Lancet Series on Midwifery. You will learn from nearly 20 expert contributors as they discuss their research and personal experiences in low, middle, and high resource settings.

Oct 26th 2026
5-12 Weeks
HI-FIVE: Health Informatics For Innovation, Value & Enrichment (Administrative/IT Perspective) (Coursera) Coursera
Columbia University

HI-FIVE: Health Informatics For Innovation, Value & Enrichment (Administrative/IT Perspective) (Coursera)

HI-FIVE (Health Informatics For Innovation, Value & Enrichment) Training is an approximately 10-hour online course designed by Columbia University in 2016, with sponsorship from the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC). The training is role-based and uses case scenarios. No additional hardware or software are required for this course. Our nation’s healthcare system is changing at a rapid pace.

Oct 26th 2026
4 Weeks
Leading Healthcare Quality and Safety (Coursera) Coursera
George Washington University

Leading Healthcare Quality and Safety (Coursera)

Ensuring patient safety and healthcare quality is critical and should be a key focus of everyone in healthcare practice. This course provides healthcare practitioners and others with an introduction to the knowledge and skills needed to lead patient safety and quality improvement initiatives at the micro and macro levels. Participants will explore the foundations of health care quality and the science underlying patient safety and quality improvement, design and select effective health care measures, analyze patient safety problems and processes using tools such as human factors analysis, apply systematic approaches including the Plan-Do-Study-Act (PDSA) model to address quality improvement challenges, and learn strategies to lead a culture of change

Oct 26th 2026
5-12 Weeks
Cuidado de heridas en el ámbito hospitalario (Coursera) Coursera
Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México

Cuidado de heridas en el ámbito hospitalario (Coursera)

El manejo de heridas ha cambiado radicalmente en los últimos años, a través del desarrollo de evidencia científica. A lo largo de su vida profesional, todo personal de la salud se enfrentará al paciente con heridas, lo cual requiere conocimientos actualizados y efectivos. Por ello, en este curso UNAM encontrarás los conocimientos básicos para el manejo de pacientes con heridas con la finalidad de brindar un cuidado de calidad y seguro.

Oct 26th 2026
4 Weeks
Tools and Practices for Addressing Pandemic Challenges (Coursera) Coursera
Politecnico di Milano

Tools and Practices for Addressing Pandemic Challenges (Coursera)

An overview of the tools, techniques, and practices that can be enacted by policy makers, countries, and organizations to monitor, manage, and react to pandemics and mitigate and govern their impacts. An introductory, multidisciplinary course covering data science, social science, healthcare, and management, paving the way to various courses on specific matters.

Oct 26th 2026
2 Weeks
Diagnosing Health Behaviors for Global Health Programs (Coursera) Coursera
Johns Hopkins University

Diagnosing Health Behaviors for Global Health Programs (Coursera)

Health behavior lies at the core of any successful public health intervention. While we will examine the behavior of individual in depth in this course, we also recognize by way of the Ecological Model that individual behavior is encouraged or constrained by the behavior of families, social groups, communities, organizations and policy makers. We recognize that behavior change is not a simplistic process but requires an understanding of dimensions like frequency, complexity and cultural congruity. Such behavioral analysis is strengthened through the use of a toolkit of theoretical models and practical frameworks.

Oct 26th 2026
4 Weeks
Spanish for Successful Communication in Healthcare Settings (Coursera) Coursera
Rice University

Spanish for Successful Communication in Healthcare Settings (Coursera)

Welcome to Spanish for Successful Communication in Healthcare Settings! This course is structured in four modules, each one revolving on a topic related to the physician-patient interaction. Each module contains four lessons; on grammar, vocabulary, the dynamics of the spoken interaction, and aspects of sociocultural relevance. The video lessons are unlike regular “lectures” in which you are just listening.

Oct 26th 2026
4 Weeks