"The courses I found to be of greatest benefit to me and my work were PHDA 01 (Working with Administrative Data) and PHDA 05 (Longitudinal Analysis and Multi-level Modeling of Population Health Data). These courses provided practical skills that I find I apply regularly to my job, and made me much more comfortable with using data analytic programs like SAS."
I was in Canada and the program seemed a perfect fit to my interests.
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.
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.
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.
Yes, I would recommend this program and regularly circulate information about the courses as updates come to me.
It was a really great experience and I learnt a great many new things so thank you!
"The Population Health and GIS (PHDA 03) course was the most interesting course I took. The labs were easy to follow and I enjoyed the final project."
"Great instructors with content expertise who are also very accessible for extra support, good class size with diverse classmates, and flexibility that online learning offers."
"I was browsing for some relevant programs that would complement my current job as an epidemiologist. The PHDA courses looked good, particularly the GIS ones which I wanted to learn as it hadn’t been part of my education up to that point. The coursework was comprehensive but not too time consuming. The GIS courses were fantastic and provided great information. I liked the method of instruction – videos that walked you through the steps of an assignment accompanied by PDF’s, which I thought helped me learn efficiently."
University of British Columbia, 201-2206 East Mall, Vancouver BC V6T 1Z3
Health Data Research Network Canada (HDRN) member
International Population Data Linkage Network (IPDLN) member
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