AI in Health Care Certificate of Specialization
Find the right course for the work you want to do with AI in health care. Build your understanding, apply existing tools, or create new solutions and ways of working. Start with a single course or work toward a 3-course Harvard Chan certificate.
Certificate Overview
- Earn a Certificate of Completion with 1 course
- Earn a Certificate of Specialization with 3 courses
- Earn an Advanced Certificate of Specialization with 5 courses
Choose learning for your next step
AI literacy: understand AI and how it works. For people who are new to AI, or already use tools such as ChatGPT and want a clearer understanding of how they work. Develop the concepts and judgment needed to assess capabilities, limitations and responsible use. Responsible AI for Health Care: Concepts and Applications brings awareness and literacy together.
AI applications: use existing AI tools in health care. For people who want to connect AI understanding with the work of their organization. In Implementing Health Care AI into Clinical Practice, gain hands-on experience in each step of the AI implementation process.
AI innovation: build tools, software and new operations. For people who want to create solutions or develop new ways of organizing work with AI. Explore product development through Building AI Solutions to Transform Health Care, or operational innovation through Innovation with AI in Health Care: Agentic Operations.
Learn by collaborating, building and testing your understanding.
AI offers a powerful way to investigate questions and make your understanding concrete. Through collaboration, explore a problem, build something that expresses your ideas, and compare what happens with what you expected. That something might be a tool, a process change or new software. Use what you observe to explain, revise and deepen your understanding.
Ask → Build → Observe → Explain → Revise
Learning activities reflect each course’s focus, from cases and guided demonstrations to team prototype development. Innovation builds on AI literacy and an understanding of application in health care; these foundations may come from previous learning or experience.
Take one course or work toward a certificate. Earn a Certificate of Completion for an individual course. For the three-course Certificate of Specialization, complete Responsible AI and two eligible AI electives within five years. The Advanced Certificate adds a different AI elective and an eligible leadership course, with all five courses completed within seven years.
Certificate Criteria
AI in Health Care Certificate of Specialization
Completion requirement: 7.5 credits within five years
- Core (Required; 2.5 credits):
- Responsible AI in Health Care: Concepts and Applications (2.5 Credits)
AI literacy: understand AI and make informed judgments. Build literacy from basic awareness through understanding capabilities, assessing limitations and considering responsible use in health care. Relevant both to newcomers and to people already using tools such as ChatGPT. No technical background required.
- Responsible AI in Health Care: Concepts and Applications (2.5 Credits)
- AI Electives (Choose 2 courses; 5 credits total):
- Implementing Health Care AI into Clinical Practice (2.5 Credits)
Applications: lead adoption in clinical practice. Assess workflows, evaluate AI models and plan deployment, maintenance and organizational change. Work through a clinical implementation case with expert guidance. General understanding of AI and health care systems recommended. - Building AI Solutions to Transform Health Care (2.5 Credits)
Product innovation: develop and test a new solution. Create a product specification and build and test an early prototype in a guided project team, with faculty feedback. Develop a method you can apply to future health care problems. Foundational AI familiarity expected; no formal software engineering background required. - Innovation with AI in Health Care: Agentic Operations (2.5 Credits)
Operational innovation: rethink how work is done. Explore workflows, team roles, agents acting within delegated authority, and the evaluation and human judgment needed to guide them. Learn through faculty teaching, guided demonstrations and discussion, with optional exercises. AI familiarity recommended; no coding skills required. - AI in Health Systems (Coming Soon)
- Implementing Health Care AI into Clinical Practice (2.5 Credits)
Note: Certificate criteria were updated in March 2026. If you began the certificate prior to this update, the original requirements will apply. Please contact enrollment@hsph.harvard.edu with any questions.
Advanced Certificate Criteria
AI in Health Care Leadership Advanced Certificate of Specialization
Extend your AI learning with an additional AI elective and leadership study relevant to your work. Complete the following requirements within 7 years:
- The AI in Health Care Certificate of Specialization 3-course requirement
- Additional AI Elective (Choose 1; 2.5 credits)*:
- Innovation with AI in Health Care: Agentic Operations (2.5 credits)
- Implementing Health Care AI into Clinical Practice (2.5 credits)
- Building AI Solutions in Health Care (2.5 credits)
- AI in Health Systems (Coming Soon)
- Leadership Elective (Choose 1; 2.5 credits):
- Conflict, Feedback, and Negotiation in Health Care (2.5 credits)
- Financial Management in Health Care for Non-Financial Managers (2.5 credits)
- Leadership Development to Improve Health Outcomes for All (2.5 credits)
- Emerging Women Executives in Health Care (2.5 credits)
- Applied Health Care Quality Improvement Through Simulation (2.5 credits)
- Health Crisis Leadership: Decision-Making, Strategy, and Simulation (2.5 credits)
- Fundamentals of Designing for Scale in Health Care (1.25 credits)
- Health Care Leadership Essentials for Nurses (1.25 credits)
*Note: This elective must be different from those already applied toward the AI in Health Care Certificate of Specialization.
Program Directors
From our Alumni
This certification provides a deep understanding of how artificial intelligence can be used in business applications to improve patient outcomes
Dr. Anuja Joshi, BSc, MSc, OD, Doctor at CareMount Medical – Optum
See our Faculty in Action
In the video below, you can hear directly from course faculty on how AI is reshaping healthcare operations and patient care. This discussion offers a preview of the key concepts and case studies you’ll explore more deeply in this program.
Frequently Asked Questions
You pay for each course separately. The total depends on the courses you choose and the fees for their respective offerings. Follow the course links above for current dates, prices and availability.
Complete the three-course Certificate of Specialization within five years. Complete the five-course Advanced Certificate of Specialization within seven years. Earlier participants should check the March 2026 criteria note above, and reach out to enrollment@hsph.harvard.edu with any questions
Yes. You can take an individual course for focused learning and receive a Certificate of Completion. Eligible courses can later count toward a Certificate of Specialization, subject to its requirements and completion window.
The Certificate of Specialization requires Responsible AI and two eligible AI electives. The Advanced Certificate adds a different AI elective and one eligible leadership course, for five courses in total. Both build on learning from individual courses; the advanced option extends the breadth of AI and leadership study.
For AI awareness or literacy, begin with Responsible AI. It is relevant both if you are new to AI and if you already use tools such as ChatGPT but want a stronger understanding of how they work.
For applications, choose Implementing to learn about adoption in clinical practice. For innovation, choose Building to develop and test an early solution, or Agentic Operations to explore new ways of organizing work with AI agents.
Innovation draws on foundational AI understanding and knowledge of application in health care, which may come from previous learning or experience. Review each course’s preparation and format. Responsible AI remains the required certificate core; there is no compulsory sequence through all four courses. If you are unsure where to begin, ask the enrollment team for advice.
Tell the enrollment team about your AI experience, your responsibilities and the challenge you want to address. Email enrollment@hsph.harvard.edu for advice on course fit, next offerings and how completed courses count toward a certificate.