Biomedical informatics (BI) is “the interdisciplinary field that studies and pursues the effective uses of biomedical data, information, and knowledge for scientific inquiry, problem solving and decision making, motivated by efforts to improve human health” ¹ . BI has an important role in healthcare therefore health professionals well-trained in the use of information and communication technology are needed ² .

In developing countries, a few of they have developed training programmes in biomedical or health informatics ³ . These programmes are short courses, Master’s programmes and even sub-specialty programmes ³ . However, these do not supply the need for health professionals with BI skills. The internet allows health professionals to have easy access to educative sources through platforms such massive open online courses (MOOCs) ⁴ .

MOOCs are accessible through the web and open to registration for people all around the world that want to participate in higher education courses; they are recognized for their educational quality and flexibility schedules ^{4, 5} . MOOCs materials are free of charge, however, in some courses one can pay to get a certificate of completion ^{4, 5} .

They represent one strategy to reduce costs and enable continuous education in developing countries; especially learners with English language proficiency, computer literacy, and internet access ⁵ . This study aimed to identify the characteristics of MOOCs related to biomedical informatics.

A search of MOOCs was performed in several learning platforms, including Coursera®, EdX®, FutureLearn®, Udacity®, FunMOOC®, UniMOOC®, MiriadaX®, Alison®, Iversity®, Open2Study® and P2PU®, in order to find courses about biomedical informatics. The search was made from 31 October to 27 November, 2018. The following keywords were used: biomedical informatics, telemedicine, telehealth, remote consultation, mobile health, mHealth, eHealth, medicine technology, biomedical technology, IT Health and bioinformatics.

Information was obtained on the platform where the MOOC was hosted, data regarding the institution offering the course, and the original language. The disciplines were categorized into: Bioinformatics, Images, Clinical Informatics, Public Health Informatics and Data science (a course could approach more than one discipline). Likewise, the data of the duration of the course and its cost in dollars were also obtained.

The data obtained were analyzed in STATA version 14. The categorical results were reported by frequencies and percentages, while the numerical results were reported by measures of central tendency and dispersion, after analysis of normality using the Shapiro-Wilk test.

The analyses of the data identified 67 MOOCs offered on biomedical informatics in the world. The majority (71.64%) were offered by Coursera, followed by EdX (13.43%) and FutureLearn (13.43%). The majority of MOOCs were offered from institutes from the United State of America (73.13%). Out of these, the majority were offered by universities. The large majority of these MOOCs, were offered by the University of California San Diego, followed by Johns Hopkins University. Finally the language breakdown of MOOCs related to biomedical informatics shows that the vast majority of MOOCs ( 95.52%) were offered in English ( Table 1). The details of each course are shown in the Table 2.

From the MOOCs, disciplines related to biomedical informatics courses were analyzed. Some courses taught more than one subject at a time. The majority of these MOOCs, 56.72% (n = 38), were in bioinformatics and 47.76% (n = 32) in data science ( Figure 1).

The average cost of the courses was $49, which ranged from zero cost (free) to $672. Likewise, the average length of the MOOCs considered for the review was 5 weeks (Min: 2, Max: 36), with an average activity of 3 hours per week (Min: 1, Max: 30).

Within the educational platforms, Coursera® offered the majority of courses focused on BI, as showed in a previous study of health and medicine ⁵ ; authors prefer to upload their content more often in Coursera® because this is the most used platform ⁶ .

Regarding the countries, The United States, China, and the United Kingdom develop the majority of courses. There appears to be a correlation between countries that generate more MOOCs and those with higher scientific output ⁷ . It’s important to consider that Russia appears among the leading developers of MOOCs; this could be explained by the student exchanges that the Russian educational institutions have been promoting ⁸ .

The majority of courses were offered in English, with a few having subtitles in other languages such as in previous studies ⁹ . A possible explanation for this might be the vast majority of them were made in an English-speaking country. Another explanation could be the development level of BI in these countries.

Most courses approached both bioinformatics and data science, maybe because both are tools to personalized medicine and this was been a growing field in the last few years ¹⁰ . Therefore it is necessary to develop more courses focused on health informatics.

This study has some limitations, such as such as only English language courses being included, and the incomplete coverage of all MOOC platforms. However, the platforms studied are those that have the most health or medicine courses ⁵ . This is the first study that has assessed MOOCs in the area of BI. In addition, the data shows a list with all the names, languages and prices of the courses.

The recommendation of this study is to diversify the BI courses into other disciplines. We suggest further studies in this area that focus on evaluating the quality of MOOCs.

The majority of MOOCs on Biomedical informatics were focused in bioinformatics and data science, they were offered in English by institutions in the developing world.

Underlying data is available from figshare

Figshare: Dataset 1. Data base of Massive Open Online Courses on Biomedical Informatics https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.7582016.v2 ¹¹

Licence: CC0 1.0 Universal