HLTH-875 Community and Public Health
This course revisits the health system as a diverse set of public and private entities working together to build and sustain health at the community and population levels. It prepares students to be boundary-spanners within that system and to plan and manage services that optimize community and population health. The traditional "caring and curing" mission of healthcare delivery organizations is expanding toward prevention, wellness, and population health. As a result, interdependencies are growing among healthcare service delivery organizations, other community-based services and public health agencies. Topics covered in this course include both the traditional and emerging roles of public health professionals and agencies (e.g., research, surveillance, prevention, education, behavior change, seeking healthier living conditions); community health entities including community health centers, accountable communities for health and community-integrated health systems; measurement of and responses to environmental and social determinants of health; movement and reporting of health data and information moving across organizational and sectoral boundaries; collaborative initiatives such as primary care public health integration and learning health systems that crosses public-private boundaries.