Open to all master students Psychology. The course provides a broad view on eHealth in a diverse range of health care settings.
This course provides an introduction to what eHealth, or digital health, encompasses and how it can be used to enhance and improve health care in several different areas. The lectures in this course provide a broad overview of eHealth tools and applications within a wide range of health care settings. In each lecture, the use of eHealth in a different field in health care is explored, showing students current interventions, how they work, their effectiveness, and how they are deployed in health practice. Topics that are addressed are (a.o.) prevention and lifestyle interventions, chronic care and self-management, rehabilitation tools, and mental health care. Within these topics a wide range of eHealth functionalities is addressed, such as online treatment, smartphone applications, serious gaming, web portals, and blended forms of eHealth. We also discuss the ethical and practical annotations of this form of health care and its implementation in daily clinical practice.
Besides exhibiting existing eHealth applications and interventions, we focus more theoretically on how to develop and design eHealth. Questions such as; ‘How do you make sure to connect to needs and skills of your target group?’, and ‘How can you achieve that an eHealth tool is taken up in the care process and will be actively used?’ are addressed. To bring this knowledge into practice, students develop their own eHealth prototype modules in small unsupervised subgroups, outside of the lectures. This course provides students with knowledge and skills on a topic with increasing impact in health care, which puts them in a forerunner position regarding innovative (online) interventions, treatment delivery and implementation strategies.
Students have knowledge about the basic principles of eHealth and the use of eHealth in different health care settings, related to Health-, Medical and Neuropsychology.
Students have knowledge about a broad range of eHealth tools, interventions and functionalities and how they are used to improve health care.
Students have knowledge about theory and research on how to develop, implement and evaluate eHealth applications.
Students have practical experience with developing an eHealth module that fits the needs and skills of their target group.
For the timetables of your lectures, work groups and exams, please select your study programme in:
Students need to enroll for lectures and work group sessions.
Master’s course registration
Students are not automatically enrolled for an examination. They can register via uSis from 100 to 10 calendar days before the date. Students who are not registered will not be permitted to take the examination.
Registering for exams
Mode of instruction
The course contains 8 meetings of 2 hours each: six lectures, one feedback lecture and one poster presentation meeting. Also, there are unsupervised workgroups, with online tutoring (attendance of all meetings is obligatory):
Six lectures of 2 hours: to cover the relevant literature, provide knowledge about eHealth in health care and discuss theory about eHealth development, implementation and evaluation.
One feedback lecture of 2 hours to address questions on the subgroup assignment.
One poster presentation meeting of 2 hours: every subgroup presents their own prototype eHealth intervention.
Unsupervised workgroups: to practice in developing online modules and test these modules on the target group. Students make their own planning regarding when and where to work on the assignment together with their subgroup, based on a concrete outline in the course reader and information and support in the lectures. Tutoring/supervision is available during the course to discuss questions or problems with a supervisor.
Grading will be based on three assessments:
1. Writing a group report on the developmental process of the module, incorporating scientific literature and what is learned during the lectures (grade);
2. Group poster presentation of the eHealth prototype module in the last lecture session of the course (grade);
3. Individual short essay to reflect on an eHealth related topic in line with the developed prototype intervention (grade).
Students have to pass all parts of the assessment. Grading will be based on the poster presentation (20%), the paper (60%) and the essay (20%).
The Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences has instituted that instructors use a software programme for the systematic detection of plagiarism in students’ written work. In case of fraud disciplinary actions will be taken. Please see the information concerning fraud.
eHealth Research, Theory and Development: a multidisciplinary approach (2018). 1st edition. Routledge: Oxford (freely online available via University Library)
Course reader (will be made available on Blackboard)
Dr. Rosalie van der Vaart
Unit of Health, Medical and Neuropsychology