Postgraduate Program Unit (PPU) had a prolific summer semester this year. Apart from the public health internship, students completed two courses of Health Services and System Research (EPI 321), and Qualitative and Social Research Methods (SBH 301). Both courses were offered as week-long academic sessions.
The course on Health Services and System Research was led by Dr. Naveed Sadiq. The students covered key concepts of health services and system research, research study designs and ethical issues in practical research. Students were also introduced to questionnaire development, data collection, management and analysis. The course focused on applied skills and the grading criteria was linked to demonstration of learned health system research skills. The course was also attended by non-MPH (Health Management and Policy) students.
The student feedback revealed high appreciation of course design and facilitator’s efforts. Additionally, the participants requested organization of similar skill oriented courses in future.
Qualitative and Social Research Method course was led by Dr. Umair Qazi with co- facilitator Abdul Latif. Important concepts related to qualitative research, its purpose, role and importance were discussed. Different types of research paradigms, theories and types of qualitative research were also covered. Participants were involved in designing data collection tools i.e. in-depth interview guide and FGD guide for their study. Real time focus group discussion and in-depth interviews were conducted by the participants. Furthermore, students were exposed to practical data collection, data analysis and result presentation of qualitative study. Students were assessed on the basis of their submitted short qualitative study report they conducted during the course duration. A positive feedback was received for the course.
The Public Health Internship (ARP 301) is currently on-going in which the enrolled students are involved in tasks related to Community Management of Acute Malnutrition (CMAM) project implementation in Aurakzai Agency by Prime Foundation. Student internees are closely working with monitoring unit. They are effectively involved in developing monitoring checklists for field activities, budgetary preparations, and project protocols development.
