About Iph-Partnership.org

From Iph-partnership.org

The process of globalization has made public health problems global, too. A key issue in facing the challenges of international public health is the exchange of knowledge between actors in affluent and less affluent (“developing”) countries. With the overall goal of improving the structural basis of teaching in international public health, the Department of Epidemiology & International Public Health (AG3) of Bielefeld School of Public Health, Germany, the Department of Public Health of Baskent University, Ankara, Turkey, and the Centre of Social Medicine & Community Health of Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), Dehli, India have set up a university partnership in the field of public health. The partnership will develop sustainable ways of enhancing international contacts of students and lecturers through innovative internet-based learning as well as through shared teaching modules.

Goals of the International Public Health University Partnership:

• Stimulate the discussion on public health issues between students of the 3 universities
• Open opportunities for direct exchange of lecturers and students
• Create a model promoting intercultural dialogue
• Contribute towards prevention of cross cultural conflicts
• Create a platform to jointly analyse inequities, ethical implication, responsibilities of stakeholders and effectiveness of policies of different public health backgrounds
• Provide hands-on experience of PH problems in Germany (such as ageing of the population) to students of less affluent countries
• Provide hands-on experience of rationing and organisational issues in health care in a less affluent setting
• Sensitise German staff and students towards issues of developmental policy. Participation in an international partnership programme offers an opportunity to students of the partner universities to increase inter-cultural communication and cooperation, and their mutual respect for other cultures (conflict prevention).

Activities of the International Public Health University Partnership:

The following teaching modules will be established over the period 2005-2008:

A) "Virtual Classroom" including

• Moderated journal club on controversial public health topics
• Problem-oriented learning projects
• Chat room
• List server or bulletin board to exchange news and opinionsThe server software is freeware, and published papers for activities such as the virtual journal club will be chosen from the open-access publisher BioMed Central in order to achieve financial sustainability.

B) Symposium "Distance learning and electronic media" in 2005 organised in Delhi to develop innovative approaches to distance learning in middle-income countries such as India and Turkey

C) An annual 2-week Summer School "International Public Health" will be organised in Bielefeld, starting in 2006. It will be taught in English, jointly with guest lecturers from JNU and Baskent. The primary target audience will be graduate and postgraduate students of public health courses from the partner universities. The Summer School will also be open to other international, fee- paying participants. Provisional programme outline and leading partners:

• Introduction: Population, development and health (Indian partners)
• Burden of disease (Turkish and German partners)
• International development goals and strategies (German and Indian partners)
• Comparative studies in health systems (Indian and German partners)
• Health sector reform (Turkish and Indian partners)
• Migration and health (German and Turkish partners)
• Public health research methodology (German and Indian partners)
• Case studies of exemplary Public Health challenges: HIV and cardiovascular disease epidemics; psychiatric disorders; conflict and violence (all partners).

D) Short module "Epidemiology and Biostatistics" in 2007 In 2007, the partners will jointly develop a curriculum and appropriate teaching methods for a taught intensive module "An introduction to epidemiology and biostatistics" This module will be taught at JNU in 2007 and at Baskent University in 2008.

E) Distance education materials Based on the experience of the symposium "Distance based learning" and the short module, the partners will develop distance education materials for a module "An introduction to epidemiology and biostatistics" in 2007. The target group are students with little or no previous exposure to the subjects who can meet to work in groups, and who have internet access. The distance education materials will be tested in 2008.

For current activities see the section Current events.