Management

Global health: spearheadin research and educationEllen van de Poel, PhD, assistant professor and researcherImproving population health and health equity in low- and middleincomecountries is a shared, international responsibility.In 2010, iBMG joined forces with the International Institute of SocialStudies (ISS) and the department of Public Health (MGZ) of Erasmus MCto organise the Diploma Course International Health & PolicyEvaluation (IHPE) for the first time.This 10-week programme was aimed at providing participants withthe essential training in health and health services research to supportrational decision-making and policy evaluation. Some of the maintopics of the Diploma Course were assessment of population health,evaluation of interventions and policies, cost-effectiveness analysis,priority setting, governance and equitable delivery and financing ofhealth services. Fourteen students, mostly mid-career professionalsfrom low- and middle-income countries, participated in the 2010course. On top of providing an exciting opportunity to contribute tocapacity building for improvements in global health, the DiplomaCourse strengthens connections in this field between the differentparticipating institutes.Research on health financing and health services is crucial to achieveimprovements in health in the developing world.The Diploma Course International Health & Policy Evaluation fitsseamlessly in a broader interest of iBMG to develop more researchand education programmes in the field of global health.Earlier in 2009, two large European Union funded research projects hadbeen assigned to iBMG, both aimed at evaluating health care financingreforms in Asia. The first, the Community Based Health Insurance (CBHI)project, aims to evaluate an innovative method of CBHI in India. Thesecond, the Health Equity and Financial Protection in Asia (HEFPA)project, evaluates the effects of recent large scale health care reformsthroughout six Asian countries.26