The Master’s Degree in Public Health in Public Health Practice

Courses

PUBHLTH 524 Introduction to Health Politics and Policy Elective Course
Description: The determinants of health policy in the U.S., including decisions and non-decisions made by institutional and political actors at all levels of government and by private sector actors. The social and cultural development of American medicine, historical efforts to pass national health insurance legislation, growth of government's involvement in health care, and recent failure of health care reform.

PUBHLTH 525 Ethical Issues in Public Health Additional Required Course
Course Description: Problems in resource allocation, health research, adoption of technology, and related issues in the context of basic ethical principles. Group discussion emphasized.

PUBHLTH 540 Introductory Biostatistics Required Core Course
Description: Application of statistical methods to problems in public health and medical research. Topics include: descriptive statistics, sampling distributions, confidence interval estimation, hypothesis testing, contingency table analysis, and linear regression analysis. Statistical software packages used extensively.

PUBHLTH 565 Environmental Health Practices Required Core Course
Description: Concepts of control methods used by environmental health and engineering practitioners. Topics include water, wastewater, solid wastes, food sanitation, vector control, housing, and accident control measures.

PUBHLTH 567 Environmental Regulation and Compliance Elective Course
Description: Principles of environmental compliance obligations, common law, trespass, nuisance, and negligence. The major federal environmental laws affecting companies and agencies, and selected state and local regulations. Civil and criminal penalties and liabilities attached to environmental regulations. Strategies for compliance including proactive and environmental management as a method for reducing legal exposure to environmental issues.

PUBHLTH 580 Comparative Health Care Systems Elective Course
Description: The health care organizations of various countries; an analysis of their qualities to highlight advantages to the public policy makers.

PUBHLTH 590Q Globalization and Health Elective Course
Description: This seminar will identify the linkages between globalization and health and examine the positive and negative impacts which globalization poses for the safety and security of the world's population.

PUBHLTH 601 Application of Social and Behavioral Theories in Public Health Interventions Required Core Course
Description: Survey of socio-behavioral theories commonly used in public health education interventions at the individual, group, and community levels.

PUBHLTH 620 Introduction to the U.S. Health Care System Required Core Course
Description: Introduction to the philosophy, nature, and scope of health organizations; administration and organization of governmental health programs, economic and political forces and their effects on health services..

PUBHLTH 621 Health Care Organization and Administration Elective Course
Description: The theory of internal organization and management applied to health care organizations. Analysis of management functions. Interrelationship between health institutions, their surrounding communities, and government.

PUBHLTH 624 Research Methods in Public Health Additional Required Course
Description: Major methodologies useful in health research. Topics include philosophy of scientific investigation, field research, participant, survey research, experimental design, construction of questionnaires, and attitudes scales; the format for writing a research prospectus.
"Even though it is not required pre-requesite we strongly recommend students take PUBHLTH 540 Biostatistics before taking PUBHLTH 624 Research Methods".

PUBHLTH 628 Financial Management of Health Institutions Elective Course
Description: The fundamental tools for management control and decision making in health care organizations. The budgeting and financial management process. Emphasis on reimbursement for services and reporting requirements to government and third-party payor, and how managers establish budgets and financial controls to cope with them.

PUBHLTH 630 Principles of Epidemiology Required Core Course
Course Description: An epidemiological perspective on health. General approaches for describing patterns of disease in groups of people, and elucidating various processes involved in creating differing levels of health in human groups.

PUBHLTH 690L Leadership in Public Health Systems
Description: Course and field work focus on leadership theory, development, and competencies of contemporary public health leaders. Integral to the leadership role is the application of health policy leadership.

PUBHLTH 691S Capstone Experience Additional Required Course
Description: The accrediting committee of the schools of public health require that students complete a capstone, or culminating experience, prior to graduation. A capstone experience is defined as one that "requires a student to synthesize and integrate knowledge acquired in course work and to his/her learning experiences and to apply theory and principles in a situation that approximates some aspect of professional practice." This course provides an opportunity to study a practical and current public health problem selected by the students. Students will apply critical thinking, analytical abilities, and communication skills that integrate the core academic areas of public health including biostatistics, epidemiology, health education, health policy, and environmental health. The final course report acts as the official written comprehensive examination, the fulfillment of the culminating experience requirement and is expected to meet specific publishing guidelines.
Prerequisites: PUBHLTH 540,PUBHLTH 630, PUBHLTH 601, PUBHLTH 620, PUBHLTH 565, a research methods course (PUBHLTH 624, PUBHLTH 780, PUBHLTH 690A, or PUBHLTH 690H), and a minimum of 36 credits

PUBHLTH 698P  PHP Practicum  Additional Required Course
Description: Opportunity for supervised field observation to gain practice experience in selected public health agencies.
Prerequisites: PUBHLTH 540, PUBHLTH 565, PUBHLTH 601, PUBHLTH 630, and PUBHLTH 620

PUBHLTH 704 Health Program Planning Elective Course
Course Description: Foundation for program planning in community health education and other public health areas. Provides basic planning principles, processes, and methods. A multidisciplinary approach integrating the use of theory and practice.

PUBHLTH 726 Health Economics and Reimbursement Elective Course
Course Description: Concepts, vocabulary, and theoretical basis for economic analysis of the health field. Application of these concepts to health administration.

PUBHLTH 750 Public Health Emergency Management Elective Course
Course Description: Provides an operational overview of public health management in preparing for and responding to disasters. Since disasters, by definition, cannot be effectively managed by the application of routine procedures or resources, this course provides needed guidance in a variety of newly defined and emerging areas for the field of public health.
Prerequisite: PUBHLTH 565, PUBHLTH 620 and PUBHLTH 630.

PUBHLTH 753 Current Topics in Public Health Practice Additional Required Course
Description: Ecological approaches frame how prevention, control, health promotion, protection and emergency measures protect the public's health. Current topics include: health disparity, cultural competence, genomics, workforce planning, credentialing, media communication.
Prerequisites: PUBHLTH 620, or consent of instructor.

PUBHLTH 757 Public Health Informatics Additional Required Course
Description: Includes informatics content applicable to administrative and clinical systems used in public health. Learners analyze the application of information science and technology to public health practice.

PUBHLTH 780 Public Health Law Additional Required Course
Description: Constitutional and social bases for public health law. Development of statutes and regulations and their effects on social problems, including review of court decisions and preparation of administrative regulations.

PUBHLTH 790A Relationship Between Health & Religion & Spirituality Elective Course
Description: Research-based study of the influence of religion and spirituality on health, limitations and controversies, and applications to public health practice.