Overview
Health Care Law is a rapidly growing field of study, and one which has become increasingly important in the Canadian health system. Health law is a field that touches most of our lives. Health and human service professionals are frequently faced with legal concerns, whether working in hospital settings or community-based care facilities. This course provides an understanding of the Canadian legal system relevant to clinical practice, administration, and policy making.
Knowing the building blocks of legal analysis is essential to one’s understanding of the relevance and implications of law in the context of health care; therefore, these form the basis for the course. This course highlights key contemporary issues in health law, with an emphasis on case study learning. The case studies are designed to teach you to think like a lawyer as you work through problems that have legal implications. The learning process begins with sources of law, moving to issue identification, then to legal analysis, and finally, to the application of law to facts.
It is important to keep in mind that while HADM 400 contains important general information about health law and offers guidelines for application to specific situations, it should not be used to replace professional advice in situations warranting a lawyer.
Evaluation
To receive credit for HADM 400, you must complete all assessments, achieve a course composite grade of at least D (50 percent) and a grade of at least 50 percent on the Final Examination. The weighting of the composite grade is as follows:
| Activity | Weight |
| Assignment 1 | 20% |
| Assignment 2 | 20% |
| Podcasts | 5% |
| Assignment 3 | 20% |
| Final Exam | 35% |
| Total | 100% |
The final examination for this course must be requested in advance and written under the supervision of an AU-approved exam invigilator. Invigilators include either ProctorU or an approved in-person invigilation centre that can accommodate online exams. Students are responsible for payment of any invigilation fees. Information on exam request deadlines, invigilators, and other exam-related questions, can be found at the Exams and grades section of the Calendar.
To learn more about assignments and examinations, please refer to Athabasca University’s online Calendar.
Materials
Physical course materials
The following course materials are included in a course package that will be shipped to your home prior to your course’s start date:
Erdman, J., Vanessa G., & Nelson, E. (Eds.). (2017). Canadian health law and policy (5th ed.). Toronto, ON: LexisNexis Canada.
Note: Students with disabilities can be provided a password protected, non-sharable pdf file to access the textbook on line
Other Materials
Each unit may have additional materials assigned, such as journal articles, legal cases, policy reports, videos, and podcasts which will be accessed online.