Vision
Inspired by the vision of Al-Quds University, our aspiration is to become a regional center of excellence for knowledge production, learning, research and innovations.
Mission
Our Doctorate of Philosophy Program in Public Health, essentially exists to graduate highly competent, multi-disciplinary policy makers, intellectuals, academics, and researchers who are capable of promoting the health status/wellbeing and practices through offering a state-of-the-art education program, facilitating reflective and creative action/experiential learning.
Aim
The aim is to graduate highly qualified practitioners, researchers, academics and leaders who are able to contribute to improving the health situation and producing knowledge in the areas of public health.
The objectives of Ph.D. in Public Health are:
- To graduate scholars who will generate new knowledge and innovative applications through research in Public Health.
- To empower intellectuals who will disseminate knowledge through education and publications.
- To equip intellectuals who will be leaders in the health fields and who contribute to shaping health policies.
- To qualify scholars who will uphold the highest ethical standards, scientific integrity and interpersonal collegiality.
- Integrate knowledge from the public health sciences and the student’s professional discipline.
Conduct original research and scholarly work that contributes to the generation of new knowledge and innovation in healthcare. - Provide leadership in education, research, health care policy and practice.
- Contribute to academic and professional education in public health sciences.
- Apply essential concepts of public health discipline to address social inequity and diverse global health needs.
- Explore evidence-based strategies, policies, and programmatic interventions that affect health and wellbeing of population.
- Apply key principles and methods in epidemiology, applied biostatistics, research and evaluate studies in public health literature
Soon …
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The Ph.D. Public Health consists of 48 credit hours
- Core courses: 18 credit hours (Table 1)
- Elective courses: 12 credit hours for Public Health (Table 2).
- Dissertation (Table 3): 18 credit hours
Core courses: 18 credit hours (Table 3):
Table 1. List of Core Courses
No. |
Course title |
Course Number |
C.H. |
1 |
Quantitative Research in Health |
8806901 |
3 |
2 |
Qualitative Research in Health |
8806902 |
3 |
3 |
Advanced Biostatistics |
8806903 |
3 |
4 |
Health Policy and Leadership |
8806904 |
3 |
5 |
Research Proposal Writing |
8806905 |
3 |
3 |
Global Health |
8806918 |
3 |
Elective Courses: 12 credit hours.
Table 2. List of Elective Courses for Public Health
No. |
Course title |
Course Number |
Credit hours |
1 |
Social Determinants of Health |
8806916 |
3 |
2 |
Advanced Biostatistics and Data Analysis |
8806917 |
3 |
3 |
Systematic Review |
8806941 |
3 |
4 |
Mixed Method Research |
8806942 |
3 |
5 |
Meta-Analysis |
8806943 |
3 |
6 |
Advanced Epidemiology |
8806950 |
3 |
7 |
Advanced Health Economics |
8806951 |
3 |
8 |
Organizational Development |
8806952 |
3 |
9 |
Managing Health Care in Complex Systems |
8806953 |
3 |
10 |
Clinical Epidemiology |
8806954 |
3 |
11 |
Causal Inference in Epidemiology |
8806955 |
3 |
12 |
Epidemiology of Non-Communicable Diseases |
8806956 |
3 |
13 |
Epidemiology of Communicable Diseases |
8806940 |
3 |
14 |
Teaching Practicum in Public Health Sciences |
8806948 |
3 |
15 |
Doctoral Seminar in Special Health Topics |
8806949 |
3 |
Table 3: Dissertation (18 hours) and Comprehensive Exam (0 credit hours)
No. |
Title |
Course No. |
Credit hours |
1 |
Comprehensive Exam |
8806900 |
0 |
2 |
Dissertation 1 |
8806999 |
3 |
3 |
Dissertation 2 |
8806999 |
15 |
Course Description |
Course Objectives |
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Quantitative Research in Health8806901 | |||
Focus on advanced concepts and skills necessary to plan, conduct, evaluate, and analyze quantitative research from an interdisciplinary perspective within health and human sciences. Practical experience in formulating original research questions and conducting a comprehensive literature review are included. Also, the course requires development of a formal research proposal with an appropriate quantitative methods research design and a detailed plan for data collection and analysis. |
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Qualitative Research in Health8806902 | |||
This course is intended to introduce doctoral students to the field of qualitative research and prepare them in the skills, techniques, and knowledge necessary to undertake independent research using this methodology. This course focuses on the historical and philosophical foundations of qualitative research methodology and introduces research strategies in qualitative research and principles for research design in qualitative research. |
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Advanced Biostatistics8806903 | |||
This course focuses on the statistical description of data and statistical measures. The course aims to introduce enrolled students to different statistical tests. The primary objective of the course is to provide students with skills necessary to carry out statistical analysis using advance techniques, including regression analysis. Generally, students will learn and apply inferential statistics techniques implementing statistical packages such as SPSS software. The course applies an in-depth information and knowledge base to interpret the data and analyze the results. The course is expected to help students conduct statistical operations for their thesis and to understand and critique findings in published research studies
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Health Policy and Leadership8806904 | |||
The course introduces students to the importance of national policy leadership in the health system. An overview of key political frameworks and theories related to policy development and offers practical perspectives on their application to health policy are provided. In addition, introduces participants to the policy development process, politics of policymaking and contextual factors that influences policy development and implementation. Conceptual and procedural tools for analysis of health policy, emphasizing role of analysis during various phases of lifecycle of public policy are also discussed. The course also includes writing policy communication and health policy briefs.
In addition, modern leadership and governance approaches supportive to policy development and analysis will also in-depth discussed
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Research Proposal Writing8806905 | |||
Students are introduced to conceptualizing and writing fundable research proposals in different health related areas. Focus is given on how to identify topic and formulate objectives, research process, develop project structure, plans, procedures, timetables, outcomes and project reporting activities. Application of grant writing principles and skills to develop research proposals following certain guideline |
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Systematic Review8806941 | |||
This course is designed to equip students with the basic reviewing skills. Students will be able to find, summarize and synthesize all available evidence in a specific area of interest to students. This course will provide a detailed description of the types of systematic review and their purposes, systematic review process, and will discuss the strengths and limitations of the method. It will enable students to perform systematic review process using the advanced skills in analyzing the studies and how to search electronic database, and on how to appraise the risk of biases. Furthermore, systematic review course will provide students with understanding of how it can be used in healthcare decision making. Finally, the students will be able to learn how to report a systematic review. Students can be equipped with the necessary skills to conduct their own systematic review
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Social Determinants of Health8806916 | |||
This course explores key psycho-social determinants of health including socioeconomic status, demographic characteristics, social relationships, attitudes, beliefs, behaviors, stress and the broader social context. It also introduces participants to disparities in health status and their underlying causes and to the strategies to address the social determinants of health and reduce health disparities. The role of psychology in determining health behavior will also be discussed. In addition, factors which mediate the relationship between psychosocial and health will be studied by using behavioral theories. Analysis of health data from an equity perspective and using data in advocacy and policy development will also be covered.
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Mixed Method Research8806942 | |||
This course will introduce students to the theory and application of research design and methods with integration of a mixed methods approach. The various conceptualizations of mixed methods design and analysis, and challenges of mixed methods practice will be discussed. The course will emphasis on the accounting for and reducing sources of error, designing appropriate sampling strategies, assessing the reliability and validity of self-constructed questionnaires and interview protocols, administering surveys through various means and analyzing and reporting results of research. |
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Meta Analysis8806943 | |||
This course will provide students with qualitative and quantitative skills to conduct meta-analysis. The course covers the formulation of study hypothesis, literature search, evaluation of study quality, statistical methods for meta-analysis, and the potential problems and biases in meta-analysis. In addition, statistical issues such as selection of statistical models for meta-analysis, practical examples of fixed, and random effects models will be used. Statistical software will be used to perform meta-analysis during the computer lab.
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Advanced Biostatistics and Data Analysis8806917 | |||
The course is an elective course for students in need for further knowledge in advanced bio statistical techniques. It Builds on the previous Advance Statistics I coursework to further develop student’s skills in using multivariate statistical techniques, particularly for time-series and longitudinal data as well as non-parametric tests. This course aims to help students recognize situations where OLS and logistic regressions models and traditional parametric tests may not apply, thus learn alternative approaches. |
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Doctoral Seminar in Special Health Topics8806949 | |||
Students will investigate, critically review and analysis of special topics related to health policy and health care systems such as economics of pharmaceutical industry, health regulations, human rights in health, needs of vulnerable groups, health disparities, quality of care, accreditation systems, and various contemporary health policies. Special attention will be placed on using research to develop evidence-based practice, policies and suggesting interventional strategies for complex problems. |
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Teaching Practicum in Public Health 8806948 | |||
This course provides hands-on experience with developing competency-based curricula for health science education programs. Program development, needs assessment, goals, course construction and sequencing, course descriptions, objectives, outlines, syllabi, content and outcomes assessment and evaluation for specific learning audiences will be described. Special attention is placed on the constructs of distance learning including the philosophical base and theories of distance learning, examination of external standards for quality distance learning coursework, and the various course design schemes related to distance learning. |
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Managing Health Care in Complex Systems8806953 | |||
The focus of this course is on how to analyze and manage the complexity of the healthcare system structure and processes. Moreover, the tools used for exploring complexity will be explored such as network analysis, agent-based modeling, scenario modeling, and causal loop diagrams. The course also tackles the governance of health system in complexity. |
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Advanced Health Economics8806951 | |||
This course focuses on contemporary issues relating to the economics of health and health care. Topics may include economic evaluation and health technology assessment, health care financing, universal health coverage, evaluation of health-care related interventions, and advances in the empirical analysis of income and health inequalities. |
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Organizational Development8806952 | |||
This course emphasizes the integration of theoretical and experiential knowledge and the development of intervention skills as ways of understanding and responding to change in organizations. Addressing and implementation of various behavioral science principles and practices in the form of interventions towards the goals of effecting organization improvement is stressed on. |
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Advanced Epidemiology8806950 | |||
This course covers the theory and application of key principles and methods of epidemiologic research in-depth. Topics include statistical modeling, confounding, randomization, association and interaction, statistical analysis and inference. Alternative approaches are identified for selecting and interpreting measures of disease frequency and measures of effect. Guidance is offered for determining objectives and strategies in study design and analysis, especially for case-control research. Methods are presented for the assessment and control of confounding and sources of bias. Strengths and weaknesses of standardization, pooling, modeling and exposure-response analysis are reviewed. |
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Clinical Epidemiology8806954 | |||
This course introduces students to the principles of evidence-based practice. Study designing, conducting and analysis of randomized, controlled clinical trials, quasi-experimental trials will be discussed. It includes topics related to the development of clinical practice guidelines; adverse effects of therapy; ethical issues in clinical research; validity and reliability and performance of diagnostic tests. In addition, issues related to the utility of non-experimental study designs in evaluating clinical outcomes will be discussed. |
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Causal Inference in Epidemiology8806955 | |||
This course introduces students to the approach of causation in epidemiology and describes methods to make causal inferences in epidemiology, and demonstrate the practical application of these methods.
The potential outcomes framework, causal diagrams, standardization, propensity scores, inverse probability weighting, instrumental variables, marginal structural models, causal mediation analysis and examples of sensitivity analysis will be discussed. |
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Epidemiology of Non-Communicable Diseases8806956 | |||
This course introduces students of the epidemiology of selected chronic diseases/health conditions and their risk factors. The trends and patterns in the burden of non-communicable disease, both globally and locally will be explained with special emphasis on the major chronic diseases’ epidemiology, cancer, cardiovascular, diabetes, cerebrovascular diseases epidemiology, in addition spectrum of disorders such as autism, asthma, injuries, violence and others. |
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Epidemiology of Communicable Diseases 8806940 |
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This course covers the principles and the practice of communicable disease epidemiology, including how communicable diseases and their control affects public health locally and globally.
This course also covers the interaction between an infectious agent, host, and environment, modes and dynamics of transmission, the role of immunity incommunicable disease epidemiology, and disease elimination strategies, focusing on issues affecting local and international society. |
disease epidemiology, including principles of infectious diseases; outbreak investigation; disease surveillance; principles of screening and screening tests;
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GlobalHealth8806918 | |||
This course introduces students to essential concepts from public health disciplines that are the foundations of global health practice. Students will then apply these concepts to current global health challenges through course activities, assignments, and readings. Students will explore evidence-based strategies, policies, and programmatic interventions to affect disease outcomes. Throughout the course, students will gain critical and creative-thinking experience in applying tools and frameworks towards addressing diverse global health needs. |
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Comprehensive Qualifying Exam 8806900 | |||
The student should pass a zero credit hours exam in which students should pass a comprehensive qualifying exam. The student must finish at least 24 credit hours core and specialty courses before registering to the exam. Students should pass the exam to register for the dissertation. |
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Dissertation I 8806999 | |||
The student should write his dissertation proposal and protocol and add his plan for the dissertation period. The dissertation proposal is critiqued for strengths and weaknesses by the dissertation committee so that the learner may develop a defensible proposal worthy of dissertation research. All ethical approvals should be obtained at this stage too. | To assure that the student has experience in a broad range of skills needed for conducting a research in his field: therefore, the student should
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Dissertation II 8806999 | |||
Research in the student’s area of interest conducted under faculty supervision, resulting in the presentation of a doctoral dissertation. |
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