Revolutionary interdisciplinary program answers national healthcare and IT needs

One year after its creation, Northeastern University’s graduate Health Informatics program has seen continued growth and praise from the healthcare community. The interdisciplinary program combines resources from the Bouve College of Health Sciences and the College of Computer and Information Sciences which collectively provide students with a thorough and robust course offering. The program has already enrolled forty three students in its first year.

The Health Informatics program brings together the divergent backgrounds of healthcare professionals seeking additional training in information management and technology and information technology (IT) professionals looking for training in healthcare information and applied technology. The program answers a national need for health informatics professionals and provides students with the theoretical and practical understanding of the role of information in the healthcare setting. The students are educated in the unique characteristics of the healthcare system, its terminology and standards, fundamentals of IT and how IT is used in healthcare.

“Included amongst the current students in the program are CIOs, high-level executives, pharmacists, nurses and developers, all of whom are presently employed in full-time jobs,” said Stanley Hochberg, MD, Assistant Clinical Professor and Program Director. “The program creates a common understanding across the disciplines needed to move health care forward with technology.”

The Health Informatics program features and impressive roster of faculty, including: Gil Alterovitz, Ph.D., National Institute Of Health, NLM Biomedical Informatics Fellow, Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts Institute of Technology; Norm Costin, Vice President of Information and Knowledge Management, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts; Steven Flammini, Chief Technical Officer, Partners HealthCare System; Leonard D’Avolio, Ph.D., National Library of Medicine Medical Informatics Fellow; and James Noga, Chief Information Officer, Massachusetts General Hospital and Massachusetts General Physicians Organization.

The graduate program in Health Informatics is currently accepting applications for the Fall 2008 semester. For more details about the program or the application process, please visit www.healthinformatics.neu.edu.

For more information, please contact Samantha Fodrowski at 617-373-5427 or at s.fodrowski@neu.edu.

About Northeastern

Founded in 1898, Northeastern University is a private research university located in the heart of Boston. Northeastern is a leader in interdisciplinary research, urban engagement, and the integration of classroom learning with real-world experience. The university’s distinctive cooperative education program, where students alternate semesters of full-time study with semesters of paid work in fields relevant to their professional interests and major, is one of the largest and most innovative in the world. The University offers a comprehensive range of undergraduate and graduate programs leading to degrees through the doctorate in six undergraduate colleges, eight graduate schools, and two part-time divisions. For more information, please visit www.northeastern.edu.