Health systems play an important role in improving life and well-being. Yet there is a profound gap between the potential of health systems and their actual performance. Today, countries around the globe face difficult choices and increasing challenges in organizing, delivering, and funding high- quality health care. In this course students will: understand the components, determinants, and approaches to the structure and outcomes of health care systems in low- and middle-income countries; learn trends in global health care reform and reform outcomes in country-specific contexts; and gain basic knowledge and skills to understand health care systems evaluations with a goal toward designing effective policy strategies that would improve health system performance.