Although in Europe and North America health management has evolved together with a greater complexity and higher costs of healthcare services, in LA healthcare management has not developed accordingly. In LA, generally, those who have managerial responsibilities, do not understand that ‘managing’ means that the mission entrusted to said organizations should be fulfilled and that accounts should be rendered for that. Especially in the public sector, there is no sense of accountability, as the obligation of managers to account for their activities and to disclose health results in a transparent manner, including the management of money or other entrusted goods and properties. PAHO and National Ministries of Health are committed to improve personnel management capacity and working conditions in order for healthcare workers to be more involved in the mission of their institutions. So that there is a group of forces that constitute a unique opportunity for HEIs in LA to develop training offers in healthcare management. LASALUS project aims to increase and improve, in LA, the access of professionals from outpatient centers, hospitals and healthcare centers, to Higher Education in Health Care Management, through the development and implementation of an international cluster curriculum in health management characterized by distance education mode and computer-based simulation training. Distance learning will provide more geographical accessibility and time and pace flexibility. The Simulation-based training (SBT) as a constructive, collaborative tool to approach to real world and be prepared is very much linked to the quality of the academic material and the digital learning environment.If competences for result-based management of personnel who hold managerial positions in healthcare services, are improved, said populations will have access to better services, especially those which are required for the achievement of the goals set in the MDGs 4 and 5.

Internationalization is a common objective of LA HEIs. Two of the most common strategies for the internationalization of postgraduate education are:1) International academic association for the development of joint programmes;2) International postgraduate mobility with academic recognition.Shortage of agreed indicators that allow the characterization and measurement in a comparable way of the principal variables involved in the mentioned two strategies has certainly contributed to hinder their implementation. Particularly important is the lack of a broad consensus on two essential components of postgraduate education that are worldwide recognized:a) Student centered learning (SCL), mainly in relation to three elements that are useful in the operationalization of said SCL: learning outcomes, competences and credits;b) Quality assurance.In this context, this project aims at creating, developing and sustaining a Latin American network of Ministries of Education and Universities, both public and private ones, in order to contribute to the internationalization of postgraduate education, by means of the consensus on standards related to substantial variables linked to student-centered learning (learning outcomes, competences and credits) and quality assurance. Consensus not only to be applied in the postgraduate programmes provided by the universities that take part in the project but to be also used as a common platform, which will be continuously updated, for all those countries and universities who wish to internationalize their postgraduate programs. Such space will be constantly open to the incorporation of Ministries of Education and Universities from other LA countries who wish to contribute to the accomplishment of the objectives of the network.The expected impact of the project is to favor the deployment of the two main strategies that have the HEIs for the internationalization of postgraduates: joint programmes and mobility with academic recognition.