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Personal Health Informatics, PhD

2023-2024 Edition

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Northeastern University's Doctor of Philosophy in Personal Health Informatics is a transdisciplinary doctoral program focused on educating top researchers in the theoretical underpinnings, design, evaluation, and dissemination of consumer- and patient-focused health systems. Personal health technologies are those that non–health professionals interact with directly, both in and out of a clinical setting and in various life stages of illness and wellness.

Examples include:

  • Assistive technologies that aid persons with disabilities
  • Consumer wellness promotion technologies
  • Patient education and counseling systems
  • Interfaces for reviewing personal health records
  • Advanced ambulatory monitoring for supporting health
  • Automated elder care systems that monitor health and support independent living
  • Social networking systems connecting families and their social and medical support networks

Developing personal health interface technologies requires that professionals have skills and experience designing systems for individual patients and consumers with a wide range of backgrounds in different contexts using a variety of media, while ensuring that fielded technologies are effective, reliable, and responsive to the needs of at-risk and patient populations. Critical skills and knowledge include needs assessment, theories of interface design and health behavior, rapid prototyping and implementation, experimental design with human subjects in challenging settings, and statistical data analysis and validation. Moreover, these skills must be deployed while working with, or leading, transdisciplinary teams.

The interdisciplinary nature of the program targets students who are interested in improving health and wellness using novel technologies that directly impact the lives of consumers and patients. This is a program for students who are not only technically strong but also socially conscious, design oriented, and interested in rigorously evaluating the technologies they imagine and build. The program provides a path for technical students to acquire more experience in the deployment and evaluation of health technologies in the field but also a path for students with health backgrounds to develop the technical skills needed to prototype and assess creative ideas they envision for improving care. The expected length of study is five years after the bachelor’s degree.

Admission Requirements

Students will be accepted with either of the following:

  •  A bachelor’s or higher degree in a technical discipline (e.g., computer science or information science, computer systems engineering) with either academic or work experience demonstrating a commitment to working in health.
  •  A bachelor’s or higher degree in a health science discipline (e.g., nursing, medicine, physical therapy, pharmacy, public health) with either some academic coursework in technology, such as a course in programming or design, or work experience where the applicant participated in the development, adaptation, or evaluation of consumer- or patient-facing health technology. (Otherwise outstanding applicants without programming skills may be advised to take an introductory programming course prior to entry; otherwise outstanding applicants without any formal experience working in health settings may be advised to spend some time volunteering in a medical or community health setting prior to entry.)

Applicants will be expected to have:

  • A minimum 3.000 undergraduate GPA
  • A minimum total GRE score of 300 or equivalent
  • A minimum GRE academic writing score of 3.5
  • For international applicants, a minimum TOEFL score of 105

Minimum Academic Standards and Requirements

Residency Requirement

The residency requirement will follow the university's residency requirement for PhD programs.

Teaching Requirement

All personal health informatics PhD students must satisfy the teaching requirement in order to graduate. This requirement is fulfilled when the student works as a teaching assistant or instructor of record for one semester and during this semester:

  • Teaches at least three hours of classes
  • Prepares at least one assignment, or quiz, or equivalent

PhD students are expected to satisfy the teaching requirement some time after completing their first year and at least one semester prior to scheduling their PhD defense. 

Dissertation Advising

Each student will have one primary advisor from the personal health informatics doctoral program faculty.

Dissertation Committee

The committee will consist of at least three members: the dissertation advisor, one additional personal health informatics doctoral program faculty member, and one member external to Northeastern who is an expert in the specific personal health informatics topic of research. The dissertation committee shall include experts with both health and technology backgrounds. The dissertation advisor must be a full-time member of the Northeastern  faculty.

Qualifying Examination

The qualifying examination consists of a three-part exam conducted by a committee of three personal health informatics doctoral program faculty members, each overseeing one part of the exam. The research core of the exam is fulfilled with submission of a high-quality paper to a strong peer-reviewed conference or journal. The health component of the exam is fulfilled when the student passes a written exam developed by a faculty member with a health sciences background, and the technical component of the exam is fulfilled when the student passes an exam developed by a faculty member with a technical background. The content of the written exams and the paper topic are developed in consultation with each faculty member.

Degree Candidacy

A student is considered a PhD degree candidate upon meeting these conditions:

  • Completion of core courses with a minimum GPA of 3.000 overall on the core courses
  • Completion of the qualifying examination

Comprehensive Exam

A PhD student must submit a written dissertation proposal to the dissertation committee. The proposal should identify the research problem, the research plan, and its potential impact on the field. A presentation of the proposal will be made in an open forum, and the student must successfully defend it before the dissertation committee.

Dissertation Defense

A PhD student must complete and defend a dissertation that involves original research in personal health informatics.

Curriculum Requirements

Required and Elective Courses

The curriculum is designed to provide all PhD students with a strong foundation in principles critical to the design and evaluation of personal health interfaces. All students take six core courses (24 semester hours) and the user-interface practicum (1 semester hour).The student must maintain a minimum GPA of 3.500 among the six core courses and receive a grade of B or better in each of these courses. All students must also fulfill the programming fundamentals requirement (4 semester hours) and the statistics fundamentals requirement (4 semester hours), where some flexibility in course selection allows tailoring based on background and experience. Two additional research electives (8 semester hours) are selected based on research interests from the personal health informatics electives list. Students are also expected to participate in the personal health informatics seminar series during semesters when it is run.

Complete all courses and requirements listed below unless otherwise indicated.

Milestones

Qualifying examination
Annual review
Dissertation proposal
Dissertation committee
Dissertation defense

Core Requirements

A grade of B or higher is required in each course. A cumulative 3.500 grade-point average is required for the core requirement.

Course List
Code Title Hours
Foundations
HINF 5200Theoretical Foundations in Personal Health Informatics4
Program Design and Development
CS 5010Programming Design Paradigm ( or another programming course)4
CS 7340Theory and Methods in Human Computer Interaction4
HINF 5300Personal Health Interface Design and Development4
Methods and Statistics
CS 7300Empirical Research Methods for Human Computer Interaction4
Complete one of the following:3-4
CAEP 7712
Intermediate Statistical Data Analysis Techniques
CS 7200
Statistical Methods for Computer Science
PHTH 5210
Biostatistics in Public Health
PHTH 6440
Advanced Methods in Biostatistics
Evaluation
HINF 5301Evaluating Health Technologies4
HINF 8982Readings1-8

Electives

Course List
Code Title Hours
Complete 12–17 semester hours in the following subject areas to fulfill the minimum program hours (see faculty advisor for other acceptable elective courses):12-17
CAEP
CS
HINF
PHTH

Dissertation

Course List
Code Title Hours
HINF 9990
Dissertation Term 1
HINF 9991
Dissertation Term 2

Program Credit/GPA Requirements

48 total semester hours required
Minimum 3.000 GPA required

Sample Plan of Study

Course List
Code Title Hours
Year 1
Fall Semester
CS 7340
Theory and Methods in Human Computer Interaction
HINF 5200
Theoretical Foundations in Personal Health Informatics
Spring Semester
CS 5010
Programming Design Paradigm
or CS 5520
Mobile Application Development
CS 7300
Empirical Research Methods for Human Computer Interaction
Year 2
Fall Semester
HINF 5300
Personal Health Interface Design and Development
PHTH 5210
Biostatistics in Public Health
or PHTH 6440
Advanced Methods in Biostatistics
or CAEP 7712
Intermediate Statistical Data Analysis Techniques
or CS 7200
Statistical Methods for Computer Science
Spring Semester
HINF 5301
Evaluating Health Technologies
Personal health informatics electives
Year 3
Fall Semester
HINF 9990
Dissertation Term 1
HINF 8982
Readings
Spring Semester
HINF 9991
Dissertation Term 2
Personal health informatics electives
Year 4
Fall Semester
HINF 9996
Dissertation Continuation
Spring Semester
HINF 9996
Dissertation Continuation
Year 5
Fall Semester
HINF 9996
Dissertation Continuation
Spring Semester
HINF 9996
Dissertation Continuation
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