Healthcare and Human Safety
Healthcare and Human Safety Program Area

Learn about key topics relevant to health and human safety that affect people’s lives, including the management of expensive resources in health systems, medical decisions, and the design of safe environments for people to live and work. Learn to harness data from electronic health records and use new technologies such as wearable sensors to improve health and safety. The U-M Center for Healthcare Engineering and Patient Safety offers additional opportunities for selected students to work in close partnership with the U-M Health System*.
Key Topics: Healthcare Operations, Workplace Safety, Medical Decision Making, Systems Modeling and Optimization, Data Analytics, Statistics and Quality
Area Lead: Mark Van Oyen
*Students interested in healthcare are also encouraged to consider the Center for Healthcare and Patient Safety (CHEPS) concentration.
IOE 413 Optimization Modeling in Healthcare
Foundation Courses
Prerequisite: IOE 265 and IOE 310, or equivalent. (3 credits)
Introduction to optimization modeling in healthcare. Linear and integer programming models are developed for problems in health and medicine. Problems considered may include breast cancer diagnosis, radiotherapy treatment planning, fracture fixation planning, and others as selected by the instructor. Emphasis is placed on model formulation, verification, validation, and uncertainty quantification.
IOE 539 (MFG 539) Safety Engineering Methods
Advisory prerequisites: IOE 265 or Biostat 503. (3 credits)
Recognition, evaluation, and control of generic safety hazards (confined spaces, electricity, fire, mechanical energy, etc.) found in contemporary workplaces, using case studies from manufacturing, transportation, and power generation. Students perform an interdisciplinary team project using systems safety engineering methods to redesign a workstation, manufacturing process, or consumer product.
IOE 813 Seminars in Healthcare Systems Engineering
Prerequisites: Graduate standing or permission of instructor. (2 credits)
Healthcare is critical to society and has a major impact on our economy. In this course, focused around weekly seminars by leading scholars in this important area, we provide a broad overview of ways systems engineering can improve the delivery of healthcare: decreasing costs, reducing error, and developing innovations.
IOE 500 IOE Master’s Seminar
Advisory prerequisites: IOE master’s student or permission of instructor. (1 credit)
Seminars presented by academic speakers and industry leaders to describe contemporary applications of industrial and operations engineering models and techniques to master’s students in IOE. The focus is on applications but research challenges are addressed as needed. Many speakers also address potential career opportunities for MS students in IOE.
Suggested courses to further explore the healthcare and human safety program area
Healthcare delivery operations
IOE 419 Service Operations Management
IOE 421 Work Organizations
IOE 425 (MFG 426) Lean Manufacturing and Services
IOE 440 (MFG 440) Operations Analysis and Management
IOE 513 Healthcare Operations Research: Theory and Applications
IOE 541 Optimization Methods in Supply Chain
IOE 543 Scheduling
IOE 545 Stochastic Networks and Operations
IOE 574 Simulation Design and Analysis
Human safety
IOE 434 Human Error and Complex System Failures
IOE 463 (MFG 463) Measurement and Design of Work
IOE 534 (BIOMEDE 534) (MFG 534) Occupational Biomechanics
IOE 539 (MFG 539) Safety Engineering Methods
IOE 837 Interprofessional Perspectives in Occupational Health and Safety
Human systems integration
IOE 430 Global Cultural Systems Engineering
IOE 434 Human Error and Complex System Failures
IOE 491-008** Engineering (UI/UX Design)
IOE 491-011** Quantifying Human Motion Through Wearable Sensors
IOE 536 Cognitive Ergonomics and Human System Integration
Modeling, optimization, and prediction
IOE 410 Advanced Optimization and Computational Methods
IOE 510 Linear Programming
IOE 515 Stochastic Processes
IOE 516 Stochastic Processes II
IOE 591 Introduction to Data Analytics
IOE 512 Dynamic Programming
IOE 517 Game Theory and Operations Applications
IOE 618 Stochastic Optimization
EECS 545 Machine Learning (CSE)
EECS 553 Machine Learning (ECE)
EECS 505 Computational Data Science and Machine Learning
EECS 556 Image Processing
Quality, statistics, and data analytics
IOE 465 Design of Experiments
IOE 466 Statistical Quality Control
IOE 491 Applied Data Analytics
IOE 551 Benchmarking, Productivity Analysis, and Performance
IOE 561 Risk Analysis I
IOE 565 Time Series Analysis
IOE 568 Statistical Learning and Applications in Quality Engineering
IOE 570 (Stats 570) Experimental Design
IOE 591 Introduction to Data Analytics
IOE 565 Time Series Modeling, Analysis, Forecasting
IOE 691 Modern Bayesian Data
STATS 500 Statistical Learning I: Regression
STATS 503: Statistical Learning II: Multivariate Analysis