Understanding and Improving the US Healthcare System (Coursera)

Understanding and Improving the US Healthcare System (Coursera)
Free Course
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Effort
Certification
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No prerequisites required; all are welcome as this course will bring principles and challenges of the US healthcare system to learners in an accessible way.
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Understanding and Improving the US Healthcare System (Coursera)
In this course, you will learn about the structure, accomplishments, and shortcomings of the US healthcare system, and how those have prompted attempts at reform. You will also take part in a unique, national group exercise, designed to help you understand how you can improve the US healthcare system.

Health is important to everyone. For most people, that means that understanding the healthcare system is important. As a patient or a caregiver for a loved one, your understanding of the system can mean everything from getting the right help, to economic stress in paying medical bills, to medical misadventures and even death. And if you’re a healthcare professional (or are in training or want to be a healthcare professional someday), understanding the system is a critical – but often under-developed – part of optimizing the help you can provide your community.

Despite this importance, an understanding of the US healthcare system is alarmingly rare. This course is designed to change that – by helping students understand the core structure and accomplishments of the system, the recurring shortcomings, and attempted remedies through policy reform. Rather than emphasizing complexity (a focus of many other courses about healthcare policy), the lessons in this course will highlight central themes that learners can take away from the course and apply to their own experiences – and other coursework – with confidence. Moreover, students who seek more advanced content will have ample opportunity to tailor their learning accordingly.

In addition, through a unique, national group exercise that will serve as a keystone of this course, all learners will have the opportunity to learn how they can improve the US healthcare system. Whether as individuals, in groups, or as future architects of system reform, students in this course will enjoy a premier opportunity to understand the US healthcare system – and their options for addressing problems in the system – as they never have before.



Free Course
No prerequisites required; all are welcome as this course will bring principles and challenges of the US healthcare system to learners in an accessible way.