An Introduction to Population Health

Please note that we will be removing this course from platform on December 20. If you enroll prior to this point, you will have access to the content until June 8, 2018, but this course will no longer appear in the catalog.

This MOOC is aimed at anyone wishing to understand the basics of population health. It provides a general introduction to some of the key themes, topics and discussion relevant to population health across the world. Primarily aimed for the general public, the course will also help those already working in health and social care who wish to improve their knowledge and understanding on this topic.

Week 1 - An Introduction to Population Health.
This week will introduce some of the main topics relevant to population health, some of which are explored in more detail over the next few weeks.

Week 2 - An Introduction to Epidemiology,
This week will introduce you to some of the ways in which we can find out more about the health of a population. This is known as epidemiology.

Week 3 - The State of the World’s Health.
This week looks at some of the major health issues in the world and considers some of their causes and their consequences.

Week 4 - Global Influences on Population Health.
This week looks at migration and poverty and how they are influencing the health of populations.

Week 5 - Population Health Interventions.
This week looks at ways of improving the health at a population level, including different approaches to the design of specific 'interventions'.

Week 6 - Your Reflections
We hope you have completed the previous five weeks of teaching on this short course. This week is an opportunity to focus on you. So you will be given direction to think about what you have learnt so far, and how this relates to your understanding of population health - and more importantly, we want you to think about applying this learning and think about how it relates to some of the things going on around you as part of your work and as part of your home environment. A short course run as a MOOC is not really about learning from the teachers. The best learning will come from 'talking' to other students, sharing your thoughts and reflecting back on the ideas from other students. You can gently challenge other students and think about how something might be different for you and your own local environment. That's why you will be guided to develop and then actively take part in a number of Discussion Boards - notice the word 'discuss'!!! And there is nothing to stop you from setting up other ways to work like this - in the past some students have set up their own Facebook pages to Dr Roger Harrison and Dr Arpana Verma.