Public Health
What is it?
Public Health Sciences is a general term given to a wide array of
population health related fields including Health Administration, Public
Health, Health Policy and Epidemiology. Epidemiology is possibly one the
most well known disciplines in Public Health Sciences. Epidemiology is
the study of determinants of health in a large population. For example,
epidemiologists investigate the effect of diet or drugs on the risk of
different cancers.
Academic Programs
- MHA- This is a two year masters degree that focuses on health
administration. The curriculum is focused on financial and
administrative aspects of health.
- MPH- This is usually a one year program in Public Health Sciences
offered mainly in the United States and Canada. Some programs such as
the one offered by
Harvard
allow students to choose different streams. Those with interest in
quantitative fields have the option of choosing the stream with a stress
on quantitative methods.
- MSC (Epidemiology) - Most Public Health Sciences and Epidemiology
programs offer a two year MSC degrees. The program usually involves a
year of didactics and one year of research which leads to a thesis
defense.
- PhD- Most programs that offer Health Administration, Public
Health or Epidemiology offer PhD degrees. However, PhD in more
Epidemiology is probably the most common PhD amongst the three. Harvard
University also offers a Doctor of Public Health degree as well as the
Doctor of Science (ScD) degree in Epidemiology.
Career Opportunities
Public Health Sciences especially Epidemiology is one of the most sought
after professions in the health care field. Epidemiologists with Ph.D
training can find careers in industry, government and academia. In the
older days, epidemiologists mainly focus their work on researching and
identifying patterns of diseases mostly infectious diseases. In the last
twenty years Epidemiology has branched off in different areas of Health
Care. Epidemiologists also identify risk factors of disease, evaluate
outcomes with different interventions (drugs, tests, procedures) in
large populations or explore patterns of use of different exposures in a
population. Epidemiology like many other disciplines has its
sub-specialties including
Pharmacoepidemiology, Health Outcomes,
Cardiovascular Epidemiology
and Environmental
Epidemiology.
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