Health information management courses

Health information management course: your study options in Australia

If you are looking for a health information management course in Australia, what you will find is university degrees: Jobs and Skills Australia rates health information management as university-level work, and the sources checked found no diploma of health information management at TAFE. Alongside the degrees there is a vocational route: the HLT50321 Diploma of Clinical Coding, a nationally recognised diploma offered by a small group of registered training organisations, including TalentMed (RTO 22151).

This page sets out both routes. It covers the university degrees and who can still enrol in them, what the clinical coding diploma involves and what it costs, and how to weigh the two against each other. For the wider field, including what the work involves and what it pays, start with our health information management guide.

A health information management course prepares you for work with the systems behind patient records: collecting, classifying, securing and reporting health data in hospitals. In Australia, Jobs and Skills Australia (JSA) classifies Health Information Manager as a university-level occupation and Clinical Coder as mid-level vocational education and training (Health Information Manager profile; Clinical Coder profile, 2024 classification). Census data (2021) shows 49.5% of employed health information managers held a bachelor degree and 30.6% a postgraduate qualification (JSA occupation data).

A search of the Department of Education’s CRICOS register in October 2026 found three Health Information Management courses open to overseas students, all degrees (Department of Education CRICOS register, 2026); no diploma of health information management appeared in the sources checked. That list is also shortening: Queensland University of Technology announced in April 2026 that, subject to final approvals, it will discontinue its Bachelor of Health Information Management and teach out current students (QUT letter of April 2026). The University of Tasmania and Western Sydney University changes are covered in our guide to health information management degrees in Australia. That leaves La Trobe University as the only university with health information management degrees open to new students for 2027.

Two La Trobe University courses remain open to new students, and both take a March 2027 start.

The master expects an Australian bachelor degree on entry (La Trobe University, 2027 intake), and both course pages publish the full entry requirements. We cover both courses and the entry requirements in detail in our guide to health information management degrees in Australia.

There is a second way into health information work, and it is vocational. HLT50321, the Diploma of Clinical Coding, is a nationally recognised diploma that prepares you for clinical coding: translating the diagnoses and procedures in a medical record into standard classification codes. It is the qualification for clinical coder roles, not for health information manager roles: Queensland Health’s careers site states that becoming a health information manager requires a university degree (Queensland Health careers, July 2026). The two occupations work with the same records, and we compare them in health information management versus clinical coding.

Training.gov.au, the national register of registered training organisations, lists five RTOs with HLT50321 on scope, including TalentMed. TAFE NSW and TAFE Queensland are not among them (training.gov.au, 2026).

At TalentMed, the diploma runs for 12 months, self-paced, 100% online, with daily intakes. The HLT50321 Diploma of Clinical Coding at TalentMed has one tuition fee of $4,995 (as at October 2026; see the course page for current fees). Students also need a coding reference: Solventum Codefinder ($495, optional add-on), TurboCoder ($572) or the printed Independent Health and Aged Care Pricing Authority (IHACPA) books ($330 plus delivery). Tuition is paid upfront or in instalments.

Queensland Health names the Diploma of Clinical Coding as an entry qualification for its clinical and medical coders, and lists educators and auditors among its health information management workforce (Queensland Health careers, July 2026). For what the course covers and how it is assessed, see our clinical coding course guide.

Start from the role you want: the degree can lead to health information manager roles and the diploma prepares you for clinical coding roles, and every comparison below follows from that difference.

Start with the job you want

The two routes prepare you for different roles, so name the job first. If you want to manage health information services, budgets and teams, the degree is the route to that role, as the Queensland Health careers page cited above makes plain. Our step-by-step guide to how to become a health information manager covers that path. If you want to work with the records themselves, coding them and querying their quality, the diploma prepares you for clinical coding roles, and you can read what the work involves in what is a clinical coder. Overall, choose the degree if you want the management role and can commit three years; choose the diploma if you want a shorter, vocational route into health information work. Whichever way you lean, check health information manager jobs in Australia to see how employers describe both roles in the postings you would actually apply for.

Weigh the study time

Time is the sharpest difference between the two. A bachelor of health information management takes three years of full-time study with fixed intakes; the diploma takes 12 months, self-paced and online, with daily intakes. If you are weighing a career change, we cover the options for school leavers and career changers in alternatives to a nursing degree.

Compare the costs on the right basis

Cost needs careful comparison, because the two kinds of qualification are not paid for the same way. La Trobe’s bachelor of health information management is a Commonwealth supported place with an indicative fee of $9,235 for a full-time year at the published 2027 rate, which comes to an indicative $27,705 for the three-year degree before indexation (La Trobe University, 2027). That amount is usually deferred through HECS-HELP and repaid through the tax system once income passes the compulsory threshold of $69,528 (Australian Taxation Office, 2026-27). The HLT50321 Diploma of Clinical Coding at TalentMed has one tuition fee of $4,995 (as at October 2026; see the course page for current fees), paid upfront or in instalments. Students also need a coding reference: Solventum Codefinder ($495, optional add-on), TurboCoder ($572) or the printed IHACPA books ($330 plus delivery). Those two figures are not like-for-like cash: one is a three-year AQF 7 degree usually paid off gradually through HECS-HELP, the other a 12-month AQF 5 diploma paid upfront or in instalments. Judge each on what it qualifies you to do, not on the sticker price alone.

Look at demand and pay

Demand and pay differ as well. Jobs and Skills Australia’s 2025 Occupation Shortage List rates Clinical Coder as in shortage in every state and territory, and Health Information Manager as not in shortage (JSA 2025 Occupation Shortage List, 2025 list). Both are small occupations: the 2021 Census counted about 2,400 health information managers and 1,700 clinical coders (Health Information Manager profile; Clinical Coder profile, 2021 Census). On pay, Queensland Health’s wage tables from 1 September 2026 put an entry health information manager at $108,091 (professional stream wage rates) and an entry clinical coder at $103,222 (clinical coders wage rates), about 5% apart, and a grade 2 clinical coder at the top pay point (CC2.4, $112,674) earns more than that entry health information manager rate (PO3.1) in the same tables (September 2026). In NSW the closest HIM classification pays about 2% to 4% more than the matched coder rate, though NSW awards carry no health information manager title and the comparison uses the closest classification: the coder rates come from the Health Employees’ Administrative Staff (State) Award and the comparison rates from the health professionals salaries tables (July 2026). We set the same figures out in more detail in health information manager salary in Australia and clinical coder salary in Australia.

Check the pathway before you plan on credit

One caution if you plan to start with the diploma and move to a degree later: La Trobe’s credit database records a pathway from one other provider’s clinical coding diploma into its bachelor degree, and that record may not cover the HLT50321 Diploma of Clinical Coding from other RTOs; no credit amount is published, and credit is assessed case by case (La Trobe University credit database, 2026). Ask the university directly before you enrol on the assumption of credit.