Summer Internships

Building research capacity in health economics

Building research capacity in health economics is an important objective of HERU.  We use a multifaceted approach which is crucial given that the international market is characterised by a substantial shortage of health economists.  We teach health economics on courses such as MSc in Health Services and Public Health Research and the MA Economics and we supervise several PhDs.  We also run the Postgraduate certificate in Health Economics, a distance learning course, and we run advanced workshops such as those in Discrete Choice Experiments and Critical Appraisal. 

This year we introduced a new way of developing research capacity in health economics.  HERU offered three summer internships to economics students who are interested in learning how health economics research is done and how it can be applied to health policy.  From the many applications we received we selected Jelena Kupcova and Jennifer Ljungqvist (currently studying economics at the University of Aberdeen) and Fraser Davison (currently studying economics at the University of Edinburgh). They are working alongside staff in HERU to learn about the sort of work undertaken. Over a period of 6 weeks each worked on a variety of health related literature and empirical projects.

Jelena says “after this Internship, I came away with invaluable skills, a new approach toward my studies and my future career.”  The scheme will run again next year.

The Internships for 2010 are now being advertised, please click here for more information.