PHDA testimonials

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PHDA full testimonial

How did you learn about the program and what motivated you to enroll?: I learned about the PHDA program through browsing on web and was motivated to get more training in population health data analysis while working full-time.
Tell us about your course experience. What skills did you develop and which courses provided the greatest benefit to you?: Although the course load was a bit heavy at times, I think I’ve learned a lot and developed hands-on experience in analyzing population health data using SAS and ArcGIS.
How have you been able to (or how do you plan to) apply your new skills in your work/research?: I have not yet had a chance to utilize all the knowledge and skills I’ve gained in my current work, but definitely have a better understanding of results that are analyzed using ArcGIS.
What do you think were the strengths of this program? Please provide examples.: The strengths of this program include: good organization of coursework, exposure to variety of relevant topics, hands-on experience using several analytical software, excellent support and feedback by instructors, and a flexible schedule.
Would you recommend this program to others? If so, what recommendations/suggestions would you give those interested in applying to this program?: I would definitely recommend colleagues and others to take this program for further professional development.
Any additional comments you would like to add?: My program experience has been great and thank you for all the support I received from instructors and staff members in the PHDA program.

PHDA full testimonial

How did you learn about the program and what motivated you to enroll?: I was in Canada and the program seemed a perfect fit to my interests.
Tell us about your course experience. What skills did you develop and which courses provided the greatest benefit to you?: I thoroughly enjoyed the courses, although sometimes I had trouble keeping up. Having said that, I found the lecturers very sympathetic to my needs. It was great to develop more understanding of the analysis of administrative datasets and in particular learning how to use geocoded data.
How have you been able to (or how do you plan to) apply your new skills in your work/research?: I will use my skills to undertake some more specific analysis using linked data. In particular, I plan to undertake some mapping of hotspots where illicit drug use is most common. For my interests at this time I found longitudinal data analysis and geocoding the most helpful. This is because with increasing use of multiple drugs it is important to determine where outbreaks occur and be able to establish cohorts of people who use these substances and then follow over time determining predictors of change.
What do you think were the strengths of this program? Please provide examples.: The flexibility of the modules was very good and I appreciated learning from other students when there was something I couldn’t solve. For example when I couldn’t run a particular program, I could easily get assistance with this. Having access to previous assignments on the same topics made things much easier as well.
Would you recommend this program to others? If so, what recommendations/suggestions would you give those interested in applying to this program?: Yes, I would recommend this program and regularly circulate information about the courses as updates come to me.
Any additional comments you would like to add?: It was a really great experience and I learnt a great many new things so thank you!

PHDA 03 Population Health and Geographical Information Systems

"Overall, the PHDA 03 course experience was great. The greatest benefit to me was learning about GIS and practicing the learning through lab assignments with ArcGIS."

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PHDA 03 Population Health and Geographical Information Systems

"I took the PHDA 03 course to update my data analysis and GIS skills so that I could apply them to my current position as senior policy analyst in environmental health. I have a number of years of policy analysis experience, which I felt would be complemented by focused studies on the application of data analysis and GIS to population and public health policy questions. The course provided a comprehensive overview of how GIS can be used to investigate various population and public health questions including: mapping administrative data; use of spatial targeting, tailoring and generating to inform health policy development; estimating access to health care services; chronic and communicable disease surveillance; and environmental health and exposure assessment. The flexibility of distance learning meant that it was possible to complete work at my own pace and schedule. It was also helpful to learn from students in different locations, who worked in related fields but had different strengths, skills and perspectives.

I would highly recommend this course and the PHDA program to my colleagues. It’s a well-structured and organized program and provides a good theoretical and practical approach to population health data analysis."

PHDA Overall program/course experience

"One of the greatest strengths of the program is the access to the Secure Research Training Lab. It holds practical, well written, easy to follow lab activities in data analytics and a very used de-identified BC Heath Dataset as well as other health related training datasets for applied learning. This provided an excellent learning environment for professional development training in data analytics."

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PHDA testimonials

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