Aims

By the end of the course, students will be able to understand the principles of health economics, and apply these principles to specific cases.

Main themes

- Introducing students to the key elements of the organisation and financing of the healthcare sector in Belgium, and to how they have developed recently.
- Analysing the role of state regulation in this sector and justification (e.g. intrinsic features of the healthcare sector) for it.
- Identifying explanations for using health services with regard to both supply and demand, with a view to evaluating various ways of regulating the sector in terms of economic efficiency and access to care.
- Introducing students to an economic evaluation of some specific health policies (cost-benefit and cost-effectiveness analysis).

Content and teaching methods

healthcare - goods like any other: implications for the organisation, financing and regulation of the sector;
typology and comparative analysis of various health systems;
organisation and financing of healthcare in Belgium;
uncertainty, the insurance market, and the role of the public authorities;
factors explaining health (e.g. the environment, lifestyle, working conditions and socio-economic status);
introduction to an analysis of medical decisions and a cost-effectiveness evaluation of health programmes;
use of healthcare: influence of supply and demand, and instruments of control;
hospitals: models of behaviour, systems of financing and control, and their influence on hospital performance;
some alternative systems of regulation, and foreign experiences (e.g. the United States, Great Britain and the Netherlands).

Other information (prerequisite, evaluation (assessment methods), course materials recommended readings, ...)

Two-year degree courses in Economic Sciences


Written or oral examination.

References will be provided at the beginning of the course.

Programmes in which this activity is taught