Public Health and Epidemiology (SVUEK_129)
About Study Course
Objective
To provide the opportunity to gain knowledge about primary themes in public health and epidemiology. To promote understanding about research and its challenges.
Prerequisites
Clinical pharmacology, statistics, basic epidemiology, and English.
Learning outcomes
• Define concept of public health.
• Describe concept of health promotion and main approaches.
• Distinguish and describe the levels of disease prevention.
• Identify social determinants of health in clinical pharmacy.
• Explain the concepts of “risk factor, cause and confounder” in the context of multifactorial theory of causation.
• Find and identify suitable data sources and data collection methods.
• Describe the concept of representative sample.
• Distinguish measures of prevalence and incidence.
• List and describe epidemiologic study designs, strengths and limitations.
• Explain difference between random error and bias.
• Name examples of selection bias and information bias.
• Identify measures of association.
• Name main principles of healthcare system organisation and financing.
• Define concept of quality in healthcare.
• Differentiate and compare public health and medicine.
• Apply the concepts of public health.
• Evaluate differences between disease prevention and health promotion.
• Compare the strengths and limitations of the high-risk and population strategy in disease prevention.
• Illustrate the link between scientific problem, research question and hypothesis.
• Draw simplified causal diagrams and define variables.
• Calculate basic epidemiological measures: prevalence, cumulative incidence and incidence rate.
• Identify study designs used in scientific publications.
• Calculate measures of association: relative risk, rate ratio and odds ratio.
• Apply and generalize public health knowledge to clinical research and practice.
• Argue the role of health promotion and disease prevention for public health improvement.
• Create research question and aim.
• Choose a suitable study design and methods for data collection.
• Foresee potential threats to scientific validity of study results.
• Interpret the measures of association.
Study course planning
| Study programme | Study semester | Program level | Study course category | Lecturers | Schedule |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Clinical Pharmacy, FFMp | 1 | Master’s | Required | Mirdza Kursīte |
| Study programme | Study semester | Program level | Study course category | Lecturers | Schedule |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Clinical Pharmacy, FFMpz | 1 | Master’s | Required |
