Health Policy, Planning & Financing MSc

The planning, financing, and organisation of health services is becoming an increasingly important concern for countries across the globe. Lower income countries are looking to transition to a universal coverage model, middle income countries are scaling up health provision, and higher income countries are facing challenges with service cost-effectiveness, health equity, an aging population and workforce shortages.

By studying MSc Health Policy, Planning and Financing, you will gain a holistic perspective of policy making that is relevant to countries at all levels of development. You’ll discover how to critically analyse health system issues, evaluate the effectiveness of policies, and devise appropriate health policy responses.

Co-designed and co-delivered with the London School of Economics & Political Science (the LSE), you’ll benefit from the expertise, resources and networks available at both institutions. And with staff who are world-leading researchers in their subjects, you’ll hear about the latest research and developments in the field from true global experts. By the end of the course, you could be making valuable contributions to local, national, or international health services and systems.

What you will learn

• Critically understand a diverse range of international and national health policies, including current and emerging trends
• Gain knowledge of selected topics related to the study of health policy, planning and financing, such as epidemiology, health economics, and social sciences
• Develop skills in applying conceptual and theoretical knowledge using a multidisciplinary approach to formulate, design, implement, evaluate and appraise health policies and plans
• Know how to assess and communicate empirical evidence, including critically appraising debates relevant to issues of health policy
• Grow your research and presentation skills, including the ability to plan and carry out a literature search to evaluate research findings

Taught by research-active academics, you’ll benefit from their knowledge and cutting-edge insights. You’ll also work alongside peers from a diverse range of countries, enabling you to learn first-hand insight about the varying health systems and health challenges faced around the world.

All of this will prepare you to work towards your dissertation in the area that interests you. Whether that’s health policy and politics, behavioural incentive design, pharmaceutical economics and policy, or one of the many other topics you’ll study. This is where you’ll apply your new skills to complete in-depth policy analysis and independent research, consolidating your learning and building confidence to influence the health policy, planning and financing field.

Who is it for?

We designed this course for anyone interested in understanding policy making for health services from a nuanced position, to make effective decisions in the delivery of health services in low-, middle- and high-income settings.

Students come from a wide variety of backgrounds – and most have experience working in health policy or public health services. Perhaps you’re looking to progress your career, or you’d like to change roles to work for an international organisation or global charity. Whatever your background, you’ll have at least one year’s experience working in health services or policy-related work. This means you’ll be working alongside students who have an enormous wealth of expertise in clinical, policy, or research-related settings with relevance to health.

Soon, you could be influencing national and global health policy and planning, leading health policy research, or working in advisory or advocacy roles in governments and international agencies.

In order to be admitted to an LSHTM master's degree programme, an applicant must: hold either a first degree at Second Class Honours (2:2) standard in a relevant discipline, or a degree in medicine recognised by the UK General Medical Council (GMC) for the purposes of practising medicine in the UK, or another degree of equivalent standard awarded by an overseas institution recognised by UK ENIC or the GMC or hold a professional qualification appropriate to the programme of study to be followed obtained by written examinations and judged by LSHTM to be equivalent to a Second Class Honours (2:2) degree or above or have relevant professional experience or training which is judged by LSHTM to be equivalent to a Second Class Honours (2:2) degree or above.