Health Informatics Master of Science

Looking at health data from all the angles

Identifying problems and crafting solutions using biomedical data—while never forgetting patients’ needs—is what we’re all about.

The Master of Science in Health Informatics degree from the IU School of Informatics and Computing at IUPUI integrates health care, health information technology, informatics, and many other fields. Our students learn to analyze and protect patient data, and to improve the quality of medical care and make it more efficient.

Practical technologies that reveal health care solutions

Our 36-credit-hour program equips students to examine how patients use their health care information, and to the build the tools that make managing information easier. You’ll complete your health informatics master’s degree with either a thesis or a project, which provides a practical solution to a health information problem.

Learn more about our Health Informatics degree programs

Far-reaching health informatics careers

You’ll find our graduates creating technologies used on the front lines of medicine, shaping the privacy and security of health information, and helping clinical teams use digital devices and new technologies to serve more patients.

Our graduates work in:

Hospitals
Insurance companies
Government agencies
Health IT software companies

$72,500

2016 AVERAGE STARTING SALARY AT GRADUATION

Plan of study

These plans of study are intended for full-time students. Part-time students should take whatever courses are available each semester.

Project track

INFO I501 Introduction to Informatics (Fall or Spring)
INFO B530 Foundations of Health Informatics (Fall)
INFO B535 Clinical Information Systems (Fall or Spring)
INFO B581 Health Informatics Standards and Terminology (Spring)
INFO B583 Security and Privacy Policies (Spring)
INFO B642 Clinical Decision Support Systems (Spring)
INFO B505 Informatics Project Management (Fall)
INFO B691 Project in Health Informatics (Fall, Spring, or Summer)
Elective
Elective
Elective
Elective

Thesis track

INFO I501 Introduction to Informatics (Fall or Spring)
INFO B530 Foundations of Health Informatics (Fall)
INFO B535 Clinical Information Systems (Fall or Spring)
INFO B581 Health Informatics Standards and Terminology (Spring)
PBHL B561 Introduction to Biostatistics I or INFO B518 Statistical Methods for BioHealth Informatics (Fall or Spring)
INFO B642 Clinical Decision Support Systems (Spring)
INFO I575 Informatics Research Design (Fall, Spring, or Summer)
INFO B691 Thesis (Fall, Spring, or Summer)
Elective
Elective
Elective
Elective

Students may use the summer for a variety of purposes, such as elective courses, thesis preparation, and project research.

Sample elective options

Other elective courses are possible upon approval of the faculty. Some elective courses may have prerequisites. Students should check with instructors before enrolling.

Informatics

Computer science

CSCI 503 Operating Systems
CSCI 504 Concepts in Computer Organization
CSCI 506 Management of Software Develop. Process
CSCI 507 Object-Oriented Design and Program
CSCI 541 Database Systems
CSCI 550 Computer Graphics
CSCI 552 Advanced Graphics and Visualization
CSCI 565 Programming Language

Other

LIS S532 Information Architecture for the Web
SOC R551 Quantitative Methods – Sociology
STAT 524 Applied Multivariate Statistics
Grad 660 Clinical Research Methods
Grad 661 Clinical Trials
NURS 607 Nursing Advanced Statistics

Learning outcomes

Upon completion of the Master of Health Informatics, students attain the following competencies expected of practitioners in the discipline:

Fundamental professional and interdisciplinary skills:

Analyze problems: Analyze, understand, abstract, and model a specific biomedical problem in terms of their data, information, and knowledge components.
Produce solutions: Use the analysis to identify and understand the space of possible solutions and generate designs that capture essential aspects of solutions and their components.
Implement, evaluate, and refine: Carry out the solution (including obtaining necessary resources and managing projects), evaluate it, and iteratively improve it.
Innovate: Create new theories, typologies, frameworks, representations, methods, and processes to address biomedical informatics problems.
Work collaboratively: Team effectively with partners within and across disciplines.

Health and health care systems skills:

Understand the fundamentals of the field in the context of the effective use of biomedical data, information, and knowledge.
For substantive problems related to scientific inquiry, problem solving, and decision making, apply, analyze, evaluate, and create solutions based on biomedical informatics approaches.
Apply, analyze, evaluate, and relate biomedical information, concepts, and models spanning molecules to individuals to populations.
Analyze and evaluate complex biomedical informatics problems in terms of data, information, and knowledge.

Technological skills:

Apply, analyze, and create data structures, algorithms, programming, mathematics, statistics.
Apply, analyze, and create technological approaches in the context of biomedical problems.
Apply and evaluate methods of inquiry and criteria for selecting and using algorithms, techniques, and methods to solve substantive health informatics problems.

Human and social context:

Health Informatics recognizes that people are the end users of biomedical information, draws on the social and behavioral sciences to inform the design, development, and evaluation of technical solutions, policies, and economic, ethical, social, educational, and organizational systems.

The above learning outcomes are guided by this article:

Kulikowski, C. A., Shortliffe, E. H., Currie, L. M., Elkin, P. L., Hunter, L. E., Johnson, T. R., … & Smith, J. W. (2012). AMIA Board white paper: definition of biomedical informatics and specification of core competencies for graduate education in the discipline. Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association, 19(6), 931-938.