Public Health MPH

The modules for this course can be found in the latest programme specification.

Module Information:

Semester 1

Introduction to Public Health (20 credits) core

The module will explore the history, ideological, political and philosophical underpinning of contemporary public health within a globalised and localised context. The module considers contemporary national and international policy, the relevance and importance of public health to contemporary health care practice and the implications for the health of individuals, groups and communities.

Epidemiology & Biostatistics (20 credits) core

This module provides an introduction to the basic concepts in statistics and the main epidemiological methods used to identify and quantify disease and associated risks.

Optional Modules

Long Term Conditions (20 credits) core for Long Term Conditions specialism

This module will explore the epidemiology and public health aspects of long term conditions. The module considers contemporary public health approaches and practice to managing long term conditions and health promotion for the prevention of long term conditions. The module will also explore new models of care.

PHARM1 Quality Assurance and medicines control (20 credits) core for Pharmaceutical specialism

This module aims to provide students with the opportunity to develop their knowledge & understanding of the principles of Quality Assurance (QA), Quality Control (QC) & Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) necessary for assuring & managing product quality in the manufacture of medicines. It will also enable students to develop their knowledge & understanding of current regulatory procedures in the licensing of medicines, the concepts of modern instrumental analysis & the monitoring of the quality of medicines during processing & at the final product stage.

Introduction to Health Informatics (20 credits) core for Health Informatics specialism

The module provides an introduction to problem solving using computing tools, and focuses on the following modern topics in Computer Science: 1. Object-oriented programming. 2. Object-oriented design method. 3. Modern operating system and its tools. 4. Programming constructs data and control structures. 5. Advanced topics in programming. 6. Testing and debugging programs.

Health Promotion (20 credits)

The module will provide the ideology, theory and practice of health promotion and explore contemporary policy associated with health improvement and modernising public health. The module will assist in applying learning to developing, planning and evaluating health promotion interventions and programmes in response to health promotion issues.

Communicable Disease Control (20 credits)

This module will explore the principles of Communicable disease control, focussing on immunisation, disease surveillance, and outbreak and incident management. The module will draw on examples of a broad range of important diseases, including TB, Influenza, Diarrhoeal diseases and HIV/AIDS.

Leadership & Management: Theory and Practice (20 credits) core for Leadership & Management specialism

The module will provide students with the opportunity to develop a critical understanding of the theory and practice related to the management of quality of services; analyse and develop their own practice in relation to the management of quality; develop and sustain service improvement; develop a critical understanding of policy and change within their area of service delivery; analyse and apply policy and change within their area of service delivery.

Undertaking a systematic review (20 credits)

This module aims to advance student knowledge and understanding of the process for conducting a systematic review. It will provide students with an overview of common research approaches and statistical tests that may be encountered in the research literature and guide students through the process of developing a systematic search strategy, identifying appropriate research studies, critical evaluation skills, data extraction, data synthesis, meta-analysis and report writing.

Semester 2

Research Methods (20 credits)

This module will provide an introduction to research, research methods, study design and evidence based practice.

Health Needs/Impact Assessment (20 credits)

The module explores how to identify and describe the health needs of a particular population. The module considers what evidence is needed to inform public health decisions, how to estimate the effect that any intervention of policy might have and how to measure and evaluate the outcome of interventions to improve health.

Optional Modules

Health Promoting Palliative Care (20 credits)

This module introduces the 'new' public health approach to palliative care. This approach emphasises the importance of public education, social ecology and community development strategies in targeting the social epidemiology of dying, bereavement and long-term care-giving as well as promoting health and wellbeing for people living with a life-limiting condition, long-term care-giving and bereavement. The meaning of prevention, harm-reduction and early intervention with respect to end of life care will be explored. The relationship between clinical end of life care and health promoting palliative care will be described. The module will explore: basic concepts of health promoting palliative care; basic practice methodologies of health promoting palliative care; local and international case studies of health promoting palliative care; research and policies issues associated with this approach; and the place of health promoting approaches to palliative care in relation to braid public health policy and practice.

Management of Pharmaceutical Supply (20 credits)

This module will provide the students with the opportunity to develop in-depth understanding of the processes and strategies for the procurement of medicines and its relevance to the availability of affordable quality medicine. Students will also develop their knowledge & understanding of the principles of supply chain management, from procurement through to the customer, including how to maintain a reliable supply chain and issues associated with drugs counterfeiting.

Data mining (20 credits)

The module focuses on modern concepts in Data Mining: Data, Information and Knowledge. Data Preparation (Statistical Evaluation, Data Selection, Data Cleaning, Transformation of Data). Data Mining Algorithms (Association, Classification, Clustering, Time Series Analysis, Text Mining). Data Mining Methodologies. Using Data Mining in the analysis of scientific and practical data. Examples tailored to the class profile will be developed and discussed.

Strategy, Policy and Organisations (20 credits)

The module will develop a critical understanding of strategy and policy making. It will provide students with the opportunity to explore and analyse different theories and approaches to strategy and policy making.

Advanced Epidemiology (20 credits)

This module builds on the Epidemiology & Biostatistics module, where basic concepts in statistics and the main epidemiological methods used to identify and quantify disease and associated risks were undertaken. This module will include: types of data and data presentation, descriptive statistics, basic probability, distribution theory including the normal distribution and its properties, sampling theory, principles and techniques, inferential statistics, analysis of categorical and continuous data, non-parametric tests, correlation and regression, and survival analysis. The module will introduce descriptive epidemiology, measures and comparisons of disease frequency, ecological studies, cross-sectional studies, prevalence studies, case-control studies, principles of screening, study design.

Health & Society (20 credits)

The module will explore sociological approaches for understanding the relationships between health, illness, healthcare and society.

Working with Communities to Improve Health (20 credits)

This module explore the history, ideological, political and philosophical underpinning of working with communities to improve health. The module considers contemporary national and international policy, the relevance, implications and importance of working with communities to improve their health. It will also develop and facilitate critical knowledge and understanding of the factors that foster sustainability of communities, maintenance of independence and empowerment, to enable and foster effective partnership working in health care delivery and practice.