HACM9102 Financial Management and Economics in Health and Aged Care

Topic only available to students meeting the eligibility requirements for entry to the postgraduate health administration courses.

The syllabus includes:

• The nature of accounting and its role in the decision making process
• Understanding spreadsheets and their use in financial management and analysis of resources
• Cost-volume-profit analysis and marginal analysis
• Capital investment decisions
• Budget management and financial planning
• The purpose and function of financial reports
• Techniques that can be used in analysing an organisation's financial performance
• Understanding health from an economics perspective
• Approaches to health funding

This topic aims to provide students with an understanding of introductory resource management, including both economic and accounting principles, and their application to the health sector.

1. Apply basic spreadsheet skills to undertake financial analysis and budgeting tasks
2. Appreciate the distinctive features of health in economic terms
3. Discuss how accounting functions as a tool in the decision making, planning and control process
4. Outline the purpose and function of the three main financial reports, namely the Balance Sheet, the Income Statement and the Cash Flow Statement
5. Apply commonly used techniques to analyse an organisation's financial statements
6. Explain the nature of the relationship between volume of activity, costs and profit and how knowledge of this relationship can be used to make decisions and assess risk
7. Describe the budgeting and planning process
8. Identify the methods commonly applied in making capital investment decisions
9. Appreciate the role of health financing in the broader context, including different approaches to health funding