Public Health MRes

This module is benchmarked against the Assessing the evidence of effectiveness of interventions, programmes and services to improve population health and wellbeing, Public health intelligence and Academic Public Health areas in the Public Health Skills and Career Framework. Also, Functions A1 - A5, C2 - C4 in the Public Health Skills and Knowledge Framework.

Module content will include:

• Research and professional practice: Evidence-based practice, benchmarking, audit, evaluation, practice development and research, research methodologies.
• Key concepts and issues in social and behavioural research: Research topics and research questions, systematic reviews, answering questions with data, validity and reliability of data, qualitative and quantitative data, description, exploration, finding connections, formulating and testing hypotheses, populations and sampling, phenomenology and positivism.
• Research traditions and designs: Ethnography, survey, experiment, mixed method, research process.
• Gathering and analysing data: Observation, questionnaires, interviews, psycho-bio-metrics. Data analysis and drawing conclusions. Systematic reviews; meta-synthesis.
• Literature review: Searching, locating, reading and summarising, reviewing and critiquing, organising, synthesising, and using the literature. Purpose and value of systematic reviews.
• Preparing the research proposal: Identifying research questions for chosen topic. Designing a study to address the questions. Data gathering and recording, data analysis. Considering alternative approaches: Critical analysis of alternative methods of research to the chosen approach. Process of systematic reviews. 
• Ethical frameworks, constraints, data protection, confidentiality, human rights, Helsinki declaration.

The aims of the module are:

1. Provide a comprehensive introduction to social and behavioural research with regard to key concepts, approaches, and techniques.
2. Facilitate the preparation of a research proposal for the dissertation.
3. Enable students to identify the strengths and weaknesses of different approaches to their research topic.

This module is at the heart of the MRes Public Health programme.  With support from a supervisor, it is an opportunity for a student to undertake a significant piece of independent research.  The taught modules will support this process and the decision-making about the design of the research will be made in close collaboration with the supervisor, but the bulk of the work will rely on independent study.  This will provide a supportive environment for a student to develop the practical skills of conducting and presenting research that they will be able to take forward into their chosen career.

The aims of the module are to enable a student:

1. To investigate systematically and in depth a topic of direct relevance to public health, in an area that has been agreed with their supervisor as suitable for exploration.
2. To be able to design a research study that will demonstrate sufficient depth, within limited available resources, particularly that of time.
3. To enable the student to contribute to the development of the growing body of knowledge in their chosen topic area, through original research.
4. To present the outcomes of independent research in the form of one publishable scientific paper.
5. The ability to discuss and defend their research methodology and findings in an oral examination.

This module is benchmarked against the Health improvement, Health protection, Health and social care quality areas in the Public Health Skills and Career Framework. Also, Functions A2, A3, A4, A5, B2 and C3 in the Public Health Skills and Knowledge Framework.

Module content will include:

• Public health in a historical and theoretical context. The development of public health, the rise and limits of medicine, and the emergence of health promotion.
• Introduction to population health – demographics, changes in population and disease patterns, measurement of health and disease, protection and screening.
• Social justice perspective of public health with reference to the main social, economic, political and environmental determinants of health.
• Public health ethics and ideologies that underpin the policy making process in relation to key public health issues.
• Community-based and community development strategies to promote health.
• Theoretical models and their practical application to practice – brief interventions, motivational interviewing, social marketing approaches, social capital.

The aims of the module are:

1. To provide a framework for thinking critically about the nature, purposes and practice of public health.
2. To develop a critical appreciation of the determinants of health and wellbeing
3. To examine critically the potential for individual, organisational and community-based approaches to promoting public health
4. To examine critically the role of policy and power in promoting health.

Epidemiology is the study of the distribution and determinants of health and disease in human populations. This module introduces the fundamentals of epidemiology and equips students with the essential skills needed to analyse and interpret data from epidemiological studies. Focus is on supporting students to develop the required skills to design epidemiological studies, analyse epidemiological data and critically appraise epidemiological studies. 

The module aims to: 

1. Introduce students to the principles of epidemiology and statistics.
2. Develop students' knowledge and understanding of epidemiological research study design. 
3. Develop students' skills in the analysis and interpretation of epidemiological data and appraisal of epidemiological evidence.