Students will be able to learn about health policy and management in a new doctoral program next fall.

A 48-credit doctoral health policy program housed in the Milken Institute School of Public Health launched last week and will cover topics like health disparities and Medicaid policies, faculty said. Faculty and health policy experts said the new degree will teach students the necessary skills to understand and research health policy during a time when health legislation is a polarizing political topic.

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David Studdert, a professor of medicine and law at the University of Stanford, said health policy is an issue that “affects all of our lives” since “at some point, we will all need health care and we will all have a stake in efficient, high-quality, affordable health care.”

“It is an in-demand field, and I think it’s a moment in American history where health policy is one of the No. 1 public policy issues in the country,” he said.

He said a doctoral degree, as opposed to a master’s degree, provides students more of an opportunity to gain expertise in research and in-depth knowledge of the field.

“Doctoral students have more time and capacity to drill down and really understand what the field is like,” he said. “The cutting-edge research that’s been done in health policy is not all being done by doctoral-qualified scholars, but much of it is.”