Introduction to Public Health Practice and Research
HLTH 1038
Assignment: Public Health Report (50%)
The aim of this assessment is for you to demonstrate your knowledge of the Public Health Cycle in relation to a public health issue, focusing on the factors that contribute to the occurrence of that issue, and the social determinants associated with the issue.
You’ll also demonstrate your ability to communicate information effectively to a chosen population, along with providing solutions or strategies to prevent the issue.
The assessment will cover all five of the Course Objectives (CO) listed on the course outline page. Please make sure that you address these objectives in your submissions.
Topics and context for the assignment
Consider the following scenario:
You work for the Wave Bay Public Health Department (Wave Bay is a fictionalised town in Australia, for which we have set up a community website).
The Wave Bay hospital has seen an increase in hospitalisations for chronic diseases such as cancer, heart disease, diabetes and depression over the last 5 years.
Your boss gives you the important task of proposing a public health intervention to address the issue. You do some research on these chronic diseases and reach the conclusion that they are all somehow related to lifestyle factors. So, you decide to look for relevant information on these risk factors available for your community.
In your research, you find the results from a community health survey that was conducted in Wave Bay in 2012 and 2017 (you’ll find the information about the survey, and the results, on the Wave Bay community website).
Your task
You must produce a report which outlines a public health intervention to address the health issues in Wave Bay health. In order to make an evidence-based decision on what to do, you should follow the stages of the Public Health Cycle, as outlined in Week 4 of the course.
Your report should include the following specific sections:
Part 1: What lifestyle factor are you targeting?
In order to answer this, undertake a brief descriptive epidemiology of the lifestyle factor you want to target, using data and information available on the Wave Bay community website.
In this part of your report, you should:
- Present relevant epidemiological data for the risk factor for Wave Bay, using a measure covered in Week 6.
- Compare your estimates for Wave Bay with equivalent national Australian statistics (see Week 5 content for data sources). Is it higher or lower?
- Descriptive epidemiology: Discuss the issue in terms of person and time factors, as discussed in Week 6. Based on this analysis, do you think there has been change in the risk factor over the last decade? Do you think a particular part of the population is more at risk?
- Using the information above, summarise why you think this risk factor should be the target of your public health strategy.
Part 2: What are the determinants of the risk factor?
Provide two examples of determinants of the risk factor you have identified. For each determinant specify:
- Whether the determinant is upstream, mid-stream or downstream
- How or why you think it contributes to the risk factor
Part 3: What public health intervention are you aware of that could help tackle the determinant you selected?
Focus on just one of the two determinants you have identified in Part 2, and describe an intervention which could address this determinant.
Think about interventions you are familiar with, either from your own experience, or through media. For instance you might see an advertisement and look carefully in your local community.
In your description of your intervention, make sure to discuss:
- The nature of the intervention (include any links or documents that describe it)
- How or why you think it addresses the determinant you have selected
- The type of action area it fits into, as described in the Ottawa Charter (see Week 8) and the strategy it aligns with.
- The area of practice most relevant for this strategy (see Week 3)
Part 4: Is your public health intervention appropriate for the Wave Bay community?
To answer this question, briefly discuss how the intervention complies (or not) with each of the six ethical principles you covered in Week 3 of the course:
- Non-maleficence
- Beneficence
- Health maximisation
- Efficiency
- Respect for autonomy
- Social justice
Part 5: How will you know if your intervention worked?
In this final section of your report you need to describe how you will evaluate whether your intervention was successful.
Referencing correctly
You must use the UniSA Harvard Referencing system to reference all material which is not your own. This includes providing both in-text references and a reference list.
Your referencing must include academic references, quality primary sources (such as government websites), images which are not your own, and online articles. If you cite a source from a resource or video, you must reference the original source.
Referencing Support
UniSA Harvard referencing style guide
UniSA Roadmap to Referencing
Format requirements
Your report should include an informative title, and your name and student ID number should be included on your assignment document. It should be succinct, clearly and logically structured, and contain no grammatical or other errors of expression.
The assignment should be saved as a Word document. The report should be structured using the 5 sections outlined above, including headings.
This assignment must not exceed 2000 words (which includes in-text references but not the reference list, tables or figures). Any text exceeding the 2000 word limit will NOT be assessed. There is no minimum word limit but you need to make sure you have addressed all points. Text should be formatted with 1.5 spacing and size 12 font. For tables/figures you may use single (1.0) spacing and 10 point font (but no smaller than this). Include page number in each page.
Deadline
Submit your reflection as a Word or PDF document, uploaded to the submission link below. The final time for submission is 5PM Friday, 5 June 2020.
Rubric
The rubric below will show you how your portfolio assessment will be marked. You should download this and keep it handy as you complete your task.
HLTH1038.Assignment.Rubric
Submission
Please submit your assignment through learnonline. You do not need a cover sheet.
All assignments will be automatically assessed by Turnitin. Assignments demonstrating similarity will be reviewed for academic misconduct, so it is very important that you read your Turnitin reports and make any necessary changes. Turnitin compares your assignment against all assignments in the Turnitin databases AND all electronic resources such as the web or library databases and provides a similarity report. The report highlights text, images or tables which is similar to another source and calculates a percentage. The percentage on its own means very little, because if you have referenced sources, then these references should be identified by Turnitin as being similar to library databases or the original source. For any assignment where you are required to use references, the similarity report percentage will never be zero (0%).
When using Turnitin, you MUST OPEN and READ the Turnitin report, not just look at the similarity percentage. Your Turnitin report should ALWAYS show your references/reference list as being similar or the same as another source. BUT unless you have directly quoted (and correctly referenced text as a direct quote), there should no other text identified as similar to another source.
If Turnitin has highlighted areas of text within your assignment that is not a direct quote and referenced as such, this is likely to be word for word copying from a source or paraphrasing of the source; and this is plagiarism. It is always worth reading your Turnitin report and if needed, amend your assignment BEFORE you submit the final version.
Please note that it can take over 24 hours to generate a Turnitin report or longer in peak periods. Please also note that suspected plagiarism cases will be referred to an Academic Integrity Officer. For further information please access the following resource:
Be careful to maintain academic integrity
Refer to the Study Resources Moodle page for information on Academic Integrity.
Assessment
This assignment is worth 50% of the marks for this course. The marking scheme (rubric) can be found within the Assessment section of the course site. All assignments will be assessed according to this rubric.
Late submissions penalties will be applied as per the following:
- Late submissions accrue 10% deduction per day or part thereof. As the assignment is worth 60 marks, a deduction of 6 marks per day will apply.
- Assignments submitted more than 5 days after the due date will not be marked.
We will upload your assignment mark with feedback to learnonline no later than three weeks following the submission deadline.
**PLEASE NOTE**
Students are advised that the topics of this assessment task may raise issues in relation to previous or current experiences. If you are experiencing difficulties as a result, we encourage you to speak to your course coordinator (beben.benyamin@unisa.edu.au) or the counselling services available through the Student Engagement Unit which can be accessed at this link: https://i.unisa.edu.au/students/student-support-services/counselling/.
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