MPH Context Certificate: Chronic and Non-Communicable Diseases
Chronic diseases—such as heart disease, cancer, stroke, asthma, diabetes, and Alzheimer’s disease—are responsible for a large majority of the deaths in the United States and a rapidly rising share of deaths in developing countries. In addition to their effect on mortality, these conditions have an enormous impact on disability, quality of life, healthcare costs, and lost productivity, and are also a major contributor to health disparities. The 12-unit certificate is designed to provide graduates with the knowledge and skills needed to address a broad range of challenges posed by these conditions, including identification of their causes; design, implementation, and evaluation of programs to prevent their occurrence, and also to extend life and improve quality of life once they occur; and organization of the public health and medical care system to ensure equitable access to prevention services, high-quality and efficient treatment and management of chronic diseases, and improvements in accessibility to ensure the best possible quality of life for people living with these conditions.
Upon graduation, students will be able to:
- Identify the major known determinants of chronic disease and their distribution by country, community, and key demographic characteristics.
- Assess how the organization, delivery, and financing of health and public health services in the US and globally influence the activities of public health organizations and the provision of healthcare aimed at the prevention, management, and treatment of chronic disease.
- Analyze the factors that influence public health’s approach to addressing chronic disease, including health impact; availability of health data; political, economic, and cultural influences; and feasibility.
- Apply systematic approaches to develop, implement, and evaluate programs to prevent the occurrence of chronic disease and to improve quality of life for persons with these conditions.
- Demonstrate professional knowledge and skills in chronic disease for effective practice in the selected functional certificate.
Course Requirements
- SPH PH 780 Chronic Disease: A Public Health Perspective (2 units)
- Choose 10 additional units from the following course options:
| Environmental Health Focus |
| SPH EH 705 Toxicology (2 units) |
| SPH EH 707 Physiology (2 units) |
| SPH EH 730 Methods in Environmental Health (4 units) |
| SPH EH 757 Environmental Epidemiology (4 units) |
| SPH EH 804 Exposure Assessment (4 units) |
| Policy & Management Focus |
| SPH PM 755 Health Care Delivery Systems: Issues and Innovations (4 units) |
| SPH PM 832 Operations Management in Health Care (4 units) |
| Global Health Focus |
| SPH GH 880 Confronting Non-Communicable Diseases in the Developing World (4 units) |
| SPH GH 888 Seminar on Global Health Policy Issues (2 units) |
| SPH GH 891 Global Pharmaceutical Policy: At the Intersection of Process and Politics (2 units) |
| SPH PH 740 Pharmaceuticals in Public Health (4 units) |
| Epidemiology Focus |
| SPH EP 740 Introduction to the Epidemiology of Aging (2 units) |
| SPH EP 748 Drug Epidemiology (4 units) |
| SPH EP 752 Cancer Epidemiology (4 units) |
| SPH EP 758 Nutritional Epidemiology (4 units) |
| SPH EP 762 Clinical Epidemiology (4 units) |
| SPH EP 775 Social Epidemiology (4 units) |
| SPH EP 790 Mental Health Epidemiology (2 units) |
| Community-Based Prevention Focus |
| SPH MC 770 Children with Special Health Care Needs (4 units) |
| SPH PH 757 Chronic Disease Prevention (4 units) |
| SPH SB 800 Obesity Epidemic (4 units) |
