An international course on strategic information management for medical informatics students: international perspectives and evaluation

All over the world, countries more and more take part in the international society and economy. To meet the stringent requirements of this globalization asks for internationally oriented and well-educated graduates. A major challenge of academia thus lies in qualifying graduates for international positions in this new world. A crucial element in the training and education of tomorrow's medical informatics specialists is exposure to health care systems across national borders. In this contribution, we report on the international aspects of and experiences with an inter-university course for medical informatics students on hospital information systems, in particular on their strategic information management. From 2001 onwards, this course was offered jointly for students of the University of Amsterdam, the University of Heidelberg/University of Applied Sciences Heilbronn and the University of Health Informatics and Technology, Tyrol (UMIT). Based on our experiences, future establishment of international courses in the medical and health informatics field is recommended.