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Improve the health of nations
Global health issues such as AIDS, Influenza A virus subtype H1N1, commonly referred to as “swine flu” and SARS have woken the world up to the importance of public health.
If the rise the US has seen in numbers of applications to public health schools and the establishment of 11 new schools in the last 10 years is anything to go by this awareness is also filtering into the minds of graduates when considering careers. ANN GRAHAM discovers the skills they will share when they graduate.
For people who want to become part of the solution to providing better health for all people, the field of public health offers excitement and challenges. Students with interests in health administration, prevention, the bench sciences, and the social sciences, as well as those students committed to improving the health of international populations will find that public health offers a rewarding career journey.
Global health concerns such as AIDS, bio-terrorism, avian bird flu, SARS, malnutrition and global warming have significantly increased awareness and understanding of the critical importance of public health – the mission of which is to fulfil society’s interest in assuring conditions in which people can be healthy, according to the Association for Schools of Public Health (ASPH) (www.asph.org).
As a field, public health carries out its mission through organized, interdisciplinary efforts that address the physical, mental and environmental health concerns of communities and populations at risk of disease and injury. Its mission is achieved through the application of health promotion and disease prevention technologies and interventions designed to improve and enhance quality of life.
Health promotion and disease prevention technologies encompass a broad array of functions and expertise.
Health promotion and disease prevention technologies encompass a broad array of functions and expertise, including the three core public health functions: assessment and monitoring of the health of communities and populations at risk to identify health problems and priorities; formulating public policies, in collaboration with community and government leaders, designed to solve identified local and national health problems and priorities; and ensuring that all populations have access to appropriate and cost-effective care, including health promotion and disease prevention services, and evaluation of the effectiveness of that care.
Over the past decade, the US has seen significant increases in the number of applications to schools of public health, during the same period that many US medical schools’ numbers declined. Between 1994 and 2004, 11 new schools of public health were established, and the number of applications increased from just over 17,500 to almost 28,500.
At most schools of public health there are several areas of study to choose from including biostatistics, environmental health, epidemiology, health education, health law, industrial hygiene, international health and development, maternal and child heath, nutrition, social and behavioral sciences, toxicology, tropical medicine and parasitology.
Public health students come from a wide array of academic backgrounds.
Public health students come from a wide array of academic backgrounds, including the biological sciences and pre-med, psychology, anthropology, economics, and women’s studies to name a few. Students with strong backgrounds in the social sciences bring valuable skill sets to disciplines such as health education and promotion as well as international health and development. Those with knowledge of the natural sciences contribute significantly in fields such as environmental health and epidemiology, while students with quantitative and organizational strengths often excel in biostatistics and health systems management.
Very often international public health programs are based on the assumption that a profound understanding of the multi-layered and multi-disciplinary nature of public health problems is the basis for successful public health leadership. Many degree programs are therefore strong on interdisciplinary interaction and maintain an interdisciplinary flavour designed to equip students with the analytical and practical tools needed to understand the ways in which societal, cultural, psychological, bureaucratic, economic and political processes affect health, illness and adequate health care delivery.
Relevant analytical tools are borrowed from a variety of disciplines such as methodology and statistics, epidemiology, sociology, social and cultural anthropology, social psychology, political science, economics and the science of management and organization. Students learn how to utilize these tools to perform sound problem analysis and to ground appropriate health care policy as well as adequate health care interventions on the results of such analysis.
