The Ecology of Health and Medicine course will introduce students to the field of health care improvement.  Students will become acquainted with key concepts of improvement science including quality measurement, improvement methodology, patient safety, population health, and health care leadership throughout the remainder of the course.

The EHM course has been designed to parallel the Institute for Health Care Improvement (IHI) Open School online certification course in quality improvement and patient safety.  This educational resource provides additional depth and detail to augment the EHM course material.  Several individual lessons from the online course will be used as required prework for the EHM course.  This prework will enable us to utilize classroom time for practical application of the material to health care situations and systems.

Interested students are encouraged to take advantage of this opportunity to obtain the IHI Open School Basic Certificate in Quality and Safety.   Modules that relate to the coursework will be identified as required or optional out of class work.   Students who complete the IHI optional modules as listed will successfully complete the online certification by the conclusion of the EHM course.  Certification offers the advantage of acquiring the skills and knowledge required to productively participate in quality improvement work.  Students who are certified are attractive to their clinical faculty not only because certification demonstrates commitment to health care excellence, but also because these students are well prepared to contribute to projects and research.  Residency programs are emphasizing health care quality and patient safety as key domains in providing an ideal learning environment for trainees.  Students who demonstrate understanding and skills in improvement science are well positioned to be leaders in this program process.

This document describes how to register and access IHI modules.