Master in Health Data Science
Tarragona, Spain
DURATION
2 up to 4 Years
LANGUAGES
English
PACE
Full time, Part time
APPLICATION DEADLINE
17 Jul 2025*
EARLIEST START DATE
Sep 2025
TUITION FEES
Request tuition fees
STUDY FORMAT
Distance Learning
* application period opens every month of March and remains available whilst there are vacancies.
Key Summary
Introduction
Technological advances and the digitization of the healthcare environment have led to an increase in the volume of data in recent years, from a wide variety of sources such as sensors, medical devices, clinical records, and wearables.
This wealth of massive data in the field of health care requires professionals capable of extracting information that can be applied to improve the clinical care of patients and healthcare users. Data Science is one of the disciplines that respond to this demand, which, according to some, is growing by more than 50% every year. This percentage is even higher in the case of data scientists specializing in health.
The official master's degree in Health Data Science is the result of work between:
- Seven Catalan universities (Universitat Rovira i Virgili as the coordinating university, Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya, Universitat de Barcelona, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Universitat de Girona, Universitat de Lleida, Universitat de Vic).
- Université Grenoble Alpes
- Association Bioinformatics Barcelona (BIB)
- Hospitals and companies in the biomedical or pharmaceutical sector.
Moreover, the annual Summer School brings together renowned experts from a wide range of academic, hospital, and industrial collaborating institutions to present their research and the latest developments in the field.
The Master's Degree in Health Data Science receives competitive financing from the European Institute of Innovation & Technology, through the knowledge and innovation community EIT Health, and within the framework of the Entrepreneurship Training and Education-EIT Call 2022. Universitat Rovira i Virgili (coordinator), Université Grenoble Alpes, the association Bioinformatics Barcelona, Barcelona Health Hub, Amgen S.A., and Amgen Research Munich GmbH take part in this project.
Vision
- To train the next generation of innovators in digital health: graduates of the official master's degree in Health Data Science will be health data scientists with a clear entrepreneurial vision. They will be able to not only create the necessary tools to manage, analyze, and extract information from the big data generated in the clinical environment, but also to identify and valorize business opportunities.
- To train health data scientists with a clear international and multidisciplinary vocation and with the practical experience and soft skills needed to adapt to the changing and highly technological digital health environment. These skills and knowledge are acquired through innovative teaching and the connection from the beginning with technology-based companies related to the field of health, hospitals, and research groups in this field.
Admissions
Scholarships and Funding
Grants financed by the university
One of the aims of the university is to facilitate access to higher education and to prevent exclusion for financial reasons. For that reason, every year, the Universitat Rovira i Virgili offers three kind of scholarships:
- URV Master’s Grants
- URV Master’s AUIP Grants
- Grants for initiation in teaching and research URV -BIDI.
Application period opens every April and closes every month of June.
Curriculum
First year: Compulsory subjects
First semester
- Biomedicine for Engineers
- Biomedical Statistics
- Electronic Health Records
- Medical Imaging
- Scientific Programming
- Biomedical Data Challenges
- Biomedical Sensors and Signal Processing
Second semester
- Advanced Health Data Analysis
- Machine Learning for Precision Medicine
- High-performance and Distributed Computing for Big Data
- Summer School
- Ethics, Regulation, and Privacy
- Project and Research Methodologies
Second Year: Compulsory subjects
First semester
- Deep Learning
- Computer-aided Diagnosis and Decision Making
- Computational Epidemiology
- Text Mining for Healthcare
- Health Data Visualization and Communication
- Complex Networks
- Clinical Omics and Translational Medicine
Second semester
- Advanced Medical Image Analysis
- Entrepreneurship and Innovation
- Health Data Integration
- Master's Thesis
Online teaching organization
Online training will be fully supported by Moodle, the Virtual Campus of the university. This is an online learning environment adapted to the needs of virtual learning models and allows for the design of both synchronous and asynchronous activities.
The evaluation activities will be fully online, there is no need to physically show up on the premises of the participating universities. Anyway, some of the activities may be synchronous, requiring the connection of the student at the scheduled time.
Master's degree final project
The master’s degree is awarded upon completion of the master thesis project.
Students will be given the opportunity to conduct it in other settings such as in hospitals and the biopharmaceutical industry, as well as academia.
Guide to the Master's Thesis subject of School of Engineering (ETSE).
Program Outcome
he official international Master's Degree in Health Data Science (MHEDAS) is designed to meet this expected demand and has the following main objectives:
- To train data scientists to manage and analyse large volumes of health data, and to provide solutions with an impact on the improvement of health care.
- To provide the interdisciplinary training necessary to identify and valorise the opportunities of data science applied to health challenges.
- To train entrepreneurs in the field of digital health in Europe who can create the necessary tools to manage, analyse and extract information from big data in the clinical environment and identify business opportunities.
Program Tuition Fee
Career Opportunities
- Entrepreneur in the field of digital health
- Data scientist in pharmaceutical companies or the bio sector
- Data-driven project manager
- Biomedical data scientist in research centers/groups or hospitals
- Head of medical informatics in a hospital
- Advisor on data analysis in health research institutes
- Advisor for public organizations on public health management
Program delivery
First Year |
| Compulsory Subjects |
| Scientific Programming |
| Biomedical Statistics |
| Medical Imaging |
| Citizens and Patients Activities |
| Electronic Health Records |
| Optional Subjects |
| High-performance and Distributed Computing |
| Advanced Health Data Analysis |
| Machine Learning |
| Business Lab |
| Summer School |
| Biomedical Data Challenges |
| Biomedicine for Engineers |
| Biomedical Sensors and Signal Processing |
| Complex Networks |
| Health Data Visualization and Communication |
Second year
| Compulsory Subjects |
| Ethics, Regulation and Privacy |
| Project and Research Methodologies |
| Deep Learning |
| Master Thesis |
| Internship |
| Optional Subjects |
| Biomedical sensors and Signal Processing |
| Complex Networks |
| Health Data Visualization and Communication |
| Text Mining for Healthcare |
| Computational Epidemiology |
| Clinical -omics and Translational Medicine |
| Computer-aided Diagnosis and Decision-Making |
| Environmental Health Data Analysis |
| IOT and AI for Health |
| Proteomics for Health Research |
| Tools for Neuroengineering and Neuroimaging |
| Advanced Medical Image Analysis |
| Health Data Integration |
| Prediction of Dynamic Behaviour in Molecular Networks |