Systems Thinking in Health and Healthcare

Programme Information

Date: 12 & 13 June 2025, Thursday & Friday

Time: 8.30am – 6.00pm (SGT)

Venue: MD1 Tahir Foundation Building, National University of Singapore (map)

Overview

Health systems are large complex adaptive systems. Leaders of health systems and healthcare organisations such as hospitals and its related organisations and industries are constantly under pressure to ensure patient safety and quality, integrate better with other service providers including in the social and community sectors, and improve outcomes, value and sustainability.

When confronted by large socially and technologically complex systems, with things you are dissatisfied and anxious to fix, you cannot just step in and set about fixing them with much hope of helping. Good intentions alone are insufficient. Without the right approaches and tools, we often end up making it worse, and this is one of the sore discouragements of our time.

Systems Thinking (ST) is a philosophy and discipline of thinking about structural and interdependent causes of conditions and consequences of actions. Skilled application of ST and its many tools in healthcare promises to help stewards of health and healthcare systems increase their personal leadership effectiveness, as well as accelerate the changes they want to make and attain better outcomes for people and populations under their charge.

Learning Objectives

This course will enable participants to apply systems thinking to define and understand health systems and healthcare services design and delivery, analyse causes and constraints of current gaps and limitations, and identify high-impact improvement opportunities and solutions. Specific learning objectives include:

• • Seeing Systems: Learn ST as a new language to individually and/or collectively reflect, appreciate and discuss about our own health systems and services.
  • Understanding Systems: Harness commonly used frameworks and models to understand the patterns and behaviours of health systems and services.
  • Working with Systems: Embody and prescribe more effective actions and interventions in your health systems and services that optimise outcomes while minimising unexpected and undesirable side effects or consequences of your actions.

Who Should Attend?

Healthcare practitioners, managers and executives seeking to improve skills for integrated care, value-based care, or health system transformation.

Certification

An electronic Certificate of Participation will be awarded to participants who passed all assessments and meet a minimum requirement of 75% attendance rate.

Pre-requisites

A minimum requirement of a bachelor’s degree and/or two years’ work experience.

Course Instructor

Application

• Application closes on 23 May 2025 OR when the application is full.
• CME & CPE points pending approval.
• For more information on this course, please contact us at sph_cpe@nus.edu.sg.

Cancellation

• Cancellation is permissible if conveyed to the course administrator in writing via email before 23 May 2025.
• Substitution with another participant is permissible.
• Please inform the course administrator in writing via email, and provide the name and details of the substitute by 23 May 2025.
• The School reserves the right to cancel the course and fully refund the fees in the event of unforeseen circumstances.