Introduction

Mission

Our mission is to contribute to the improvement of the quality, efficiency and equity of health systems by means of research, development, education and relevant professional activities.

To solve problems and create values in healthcare systems, we fully interact with practice and policy fields and innovatively apply multi- and inter-disciplinary fields of quantitative and qualitative sciences and technologies.

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The human resource development activities of the Department, particularly for the graduate students in this major, aim to nurture highly professional leaders in this emerging field of healthcare quality, economics, management and policy.

The Department emphasizes the interaction of research with healthcare systems and policies and development for the real-world application.  One of the goals in view is to produce research and development outputs for resource- and quality-based healthcare financing system.

The Department provides several course works related to the following research and professional activities. Their styles are combinations of small-group works, problem-solving works, study critique, lectures, systematic reviews, and case studies.

Project-based activities are also very effective to develop skills and competency really necessary for one's professional career.

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 The focused areas of the Department research are as follows:

• Measurement and analysis of clinical performance, quality and safety, practice variation, technology transition and resource use
• Casemix classification and severity adjustment
• Cost-effectiveness and cost-utility analysis of healthcare technologies and pharmaceuticals
• Development and application of costing methods in hospitals and other health care settings
• Development of information infrastructure for measurement of quality, efficiency and equity of health care

• Systems of assurance and improvement of quality and safety in health care
• Measurement and analysis of quality improvement activities, job satisfaction and patient satisfaction
• Healthcare Accreditation, Management Quality, ISO management systems

• Measurement of health care quality, efficiency and equity in healthcare systems
• Transition of health status, healthcare practice and technology
• Epidemiologic assessment of health status, long-term care resource and needs of the aged population

• Development and assessment frameworks for evaluation of a health care system as a whole
• Development of policy framework to facilitate innovation in healthcare systems
• International collaborative works on health care systems and performance measures, such as collaborations with WHO, OECD and other important agencies/organizations and network.

 The uniqueness of the Department is that, jointly with the type of research which will result in academic publications, we also develop "soft" technologies and systems for quality and efficiency of health care which will be in actual use in the real world.

 The strength in the Department includes the fact that we have established the basic foundation for the above activities. Nationwide and multi-institutional databases, so-called "Big Data", also contribute to facilitate the speed and the depth of the research/development and training. The Department has invested a lot and long term in these areas.

 In many cases we collaborate with people and organizations outside our institution and academic area. The examples of such on-going development programs are as follows:

• Benchmark systems for clinical performance indicators
• Patient-level and DPC(DRG)-based costing system in conjunction with a government project and thereafter as an advanced project.
• Health care accreditation standards, patient safety management system standards, and other focused modules for Japan Council for Quality Health Care
• Benchmark systems for patient satisfaction, job satisfaction and management quality as voluntary projects and also for a government projects
• Human resource development programs for healthcare management
• Healthcare information systems development granted by ministries and local governments, including casemix classification system, National Claims Database, and so on.
• Japanese patient casemix classification system (like DRG), so-called DPC, for a government project

 The Department has the following directions and goals to achieve the mission.

 To produce, in succession, and support highly-qualified researchers who leads the emerging area of health care quality, economics, policy and management and highly-qualified managers/directors who directly commit themselves in the new arena of the improvement of systems of health care; To develop a productive and mutually growing network with those inside and outside to improve health and health care system through the expertise of the network member; To systematize, improve and establish the education and training systems for academic and management works.

 To produce academic research outputs contributory to health systems improvement through establishing more productive work systems and more effective collaborative networks; To develop "soft technologies" in succession on a stable basis which are to be actually and effectively implemented in the health policies and systems - examples are healthcare performance indicators, casemix classification and severity adjustment methodology, quality and safety management standards for accreditation, costing manuals for health care; To be a productive research team internationally renowned in the area of health care quality, economics, policy and management.