Project Management Characteristics and Education for eHealth Students

Abstract

Project management is a critical skill that is needed and used frequently by eHealth professionals.  But eHealth projects often exhibit certain characteristics that require special background and knowledge to address.  Specific characteristics that are of importance to eHealth projects and certain methodologies that can be of value in managing such projects are presented.  The focus in this paper is how to impart relevant project management and eHealth content skills to students. An approach is described where a major eHealth project case is proposed to a class of eHealth students, and used to demonstrate the application of eHealth background and project management skills to implement such a project.  For this purpose the class is organized into a number of teams, each responsible for a specific project characteristic (e.g. planning, workflow, development, eHealth standards, procurement, privacy and security, and organizational change management).  This supports learning in project management while at the same time students learn about relevant eHealth issues. This approach has been used successfully in a required introductory eHealth course at the Masters level.