Research
On the question of how sustainable innovation can be promoted in healthcare and beyond, the department is conducting various research projects.
One focus is the comparative collection of sustainability indicators for healthcare technologies and institutions: only on the basis of sustainable data can management identify, for example, where the greatest potential for improvement lies in an organization, or whether a new, seemingly "greener" technology actually lives up to this claim. To this end, we are analyzing the greenhouse gas emissions of healthcare services, for example, and are working on a benchmarking system in which institutions such as hospitals can easily compare the climate friendliness of their organization with other hospitals. This research project is funded by the state of Bremen as part of the "Healthy City Bremen" research network.
The methods of health economic evaluation offer a scientifically recognized standard for the assessment of health innovations. So far, however, they primarily include health benefits and costs for the health care system and, if applicable, individuals and loss of work performance. It is unclear how environmental sustainability (e.g., greenhouse gas emissions) can be validly incorporated into the evaluation. The department conducts theoretical and empirical research on this topic - for example, how to include the climate impact of new digital prevention services in their economic evaluation. This research project is funded by the Leibnitz Science Campus Digital Public Health.
Nothing is as practical as a good theory (Kurt Lewin): every problem solution is based on a theory of what exactly the problem is and by what effects it is solved. The application of inappropriate theories can easily lead to actions that aggravate rather than alleviate problems - in medicine, for example, when an antibiotic is prescribed for bacterial infections even though a patient is suffering from a viral infection. Economics is often accused of something similar - for example, when it tries to solve problems caused by typical human biases in feeling and thinking with concepts for perfectly rational decisions. A third research focus is to examine the applicability of economic theories to the many facets of sustainability problems in terms of scientific theory and ethics. In doing so, John Rawls' idea of the Broad Consideration Equilibrium is taken up. The aim is to develop new concepts for research and teaching that make the diversity of economic theories more useful for promoting sustainable innovation.
The Department of Health Care Management addresses these research areas in interdisciplinary cooperation with colleagues in IPP, SOCIUM, BIPS, the Wissenschaftsschwerpunkt 6 of the University of Bremen and beyond. It thus contributes to the joint activities of the university on its way to becoming a climate university.