PH 111:

Medical Care Epidemiology

(1.0 unit)

Almost a half century after John Wennberg’s seminal Science paper, the field of medical care epidemiology and the investigation of health care variation continues to inform public policy and identify opportunities for health system improvement. This ten-week course highlights the theories, methods, findings, and associated remedies, which are contrasted with the more familiar field of classical epidemiology (i.e., patterns of health and disease). This course requires a high level of student engagement during class. Course talks are pre-recorded and are viewed along with assigned readings prior to classes. Class time is primarily reserved for structured discussion of the course content in small groups and with the whole class; a portion of class time is also set aside for student questions. Specific assignments are: reading/video quizzes, pre-class worksheets requiring short answers and essays, and a final paper. Class engagement and participation is mandatory and self-evaluated by each student.

PH 233:

Applied Improvement Methods

(0.40 unit)

This course builds on PH 209 “Introduction to Improvement Methods.” It will provide opportunities to apply selected improvement methods in real-world small systems. Building from the tenet that equity is foundational for quality, the course will explore the important roles of measurement, effective collaboration, coproduction, and understanding of context, and change management in improving public health and health care using case studies and examples from the literature.

PH 242:

Health Services Administration

(0.625 unit)

Recent shifts in US healthcare policy toward reimbursement structures that incent high quality and efficient care, shift the focus from volume to value, increase revenue and cost pressures, and push leaders in public health to do more with less. Managing for program outcomes and financial soundness has become ever more demanding. The goal of the Health Services Administration course is to enable students to make value enhancing decisions and be effective leaders in the evolving health care market. This course will teach students the basic principles of financial and managerial accounting and how to make a business case for a program or innovation.

PH 238:

Leading Change in Health Policy

(0.50 unit)

This course introduces the skills and techniques required to research and develop health programs at the community, state, and national levels. Students will be presented with the concepts, processes and techniques used in health program planning, implementation, and evaluation. The students will engage in planning, implementation and evaluation exercises. The course will emphasize the importance of teams and partnerships in successful health promotion programs.

PH 226:

One Health: Pan-Epidemics in our Anthropocene

(0.50 unit)

This course will focus on understanding epidemics from the lens of the One Health triad of human, animal, and environmental health. Grading will be based on student discussion boards and student responses to prompts. Discussion of pan-epidemics will include past outbreaks due to a given pathogen, if any. Emphasis will be given to how best to anticipate, recognize, and act with regard to present and future outbreaks from a One Health perspective.

PH 252:

Health Policy

(0.50 unit)

The purpose of this course is to introduce students to the health-policy making process and examine how it is shaped by legislation, regulations and the courts. After understanding the process, students will choose a policy topic and begin to build a strategy for making the change they want to see happen. Each course assignment leads up to the final project, which is a policy advocacy strategy that includes: an analysis of a policy issue, a summary of relevant research, a stakeholder analysis and management plan, a metrics-based evaluation plan, and prepared written and oral communication points. The final deliverable puts all the pieces are together, so each student will have created a map to manifest their desired change.

PH 256:

Strategy for Population Health

(0.40 unit)

In a context of shifting reimbursement models, an evolution from volume to value, and increasing revenue and cost pressures, managing for program outcomes and financial soundness has become ever more demanding. The goal of the Strategy for Population Health course is to enable students to make value enhancing decisions and to be effective leaders in the evolving health and healthcare market. Building on financial skills, this course develops strategic thinking skills, which are critical for achieving those goals. Specifically, strategy describes what a health and healthcare delivery system should be doing in order to determine: where it’s going and how it intends to get there. The strategy modules are intended to help students recognize, develop, articulate, and implement strategy; and to expose them to a broad range of strategies for re-designing healthcare delivery and public health.

PH 220:

Anchor Institutions and Population Health

(0.50 unit)

This course will introduce students to ways that Anchor Institutions such as health systems and institutions of higher education can intentionally adapt their existing business functions to address disparities in social, environmental, and systemic/structural drivers of health.

PH 222:

Ethics in Health and Healthcare

(0.50 unit)

This course is designed to give students an overview of healthcare ethics, including recognizing and responding to contemporary clinical, research, and organizational ethical conflicts in health care. Students will build practical ethical reasoning skills and strategies for dealing with frequently encountered ethics issues, as well as approaches for anticipating and decreasing the presence of ethics conflicts. Emphasis throughout the course will be on critical thinking, real-world application, and ethical decision-making in a professional environment.

PH 261/262/263/264:

Practicum and Practicum Intensive

(3.75 units)

The TDI Hybrid MPH includes a concurrent practicum course that runs throughout the entire program, combining an Applied Practice Experience, or APE (a field study) with an Integrated Learning Experience, or ILE (written culminating project). Students develop and execute their own individual practicum with faculty support, focusing on a specific problem area or question. Skills gained in the program serve to improve health and/or health care, develop or refine policy, or generate new knowledge in a real-world setting. Using systems thinking, qualitative and quantitative methods, along with effective inquiry, student practicums will provide actionable insights and feasible recommendations.

PH 243-244:

Diversity Education and Learning in Public Health Initiative (DELPHI)

(.30)

During the summer of 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic and the murders of George Floyd and Ahmaud Arbery incited massive societal unrest across the United States. This unrest led to much-needed questions: Who are we? What makes us different? What prevents us all from receiving equal treatment in the health care system? How can we learn to understand and respect each other’s differences while promoting equality in healthcare? This course guides future public health leaders on their journey to explore our differences and their effects on society, public health, and access to health care and health outcomes. Specifically, the course helps students 1) understand how Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) relate to belonging; 2) understand barriers (i.e. Implicit Bias, Systemic Racism, and White Supremacy) that manifest in some of the most vexing health problems of our lifetime, (Food Insecurity, Maternal Mortality and Barriers to Access to Care) and prevent successful integration of DEI in health policies and interventions; and 3) practice skills that will allow them to anticipate, recognize and redress health system barriers that prevent fair distribution of resources and prevent all from receiving equitable care. This course will complement students’ work in Epidemiology, Biostatistics, Improvement Methods, Environmental Health, Health Policy and International Health.