The course Social Medicine is a first year compulsory course of Medical Studies in English. The course consists of 15 hours of lectures and 20 hours of seminars, leading to a total of 35 hours (2 ECTS). The course is conducted in the lecture rooms of the University of Rijeka, Faculty of Medicine. The lectures will be held online.
The goals of the course are introducing the students to the basic development of social medicine, the promotion of health and prevention of diseases. Lectures and seminars will explore the determinants of health and health inequalities between populations, how social factors influence medical knowledge, health care, health promotion and disease prevention. Students will learn about basic communication skills and the creation of population based preventive programs. They will get an overview of specific features of community-based organization of healthcare in disasters, the basics of health care and social care organization.
Course content: This course will introduce students to the theory and practice of social medicine to enable them to recognize social influence on population health, organization of health and social care in regular and emergency conditions, most important health risks, ways of preventive action and health improvement.
LEARNING OUTCOMES: By the end of this course, students should be able to:
I. COGNITIVE DOMAIN - KNOWLEDGE
- Understand how social medicine can contribute to care by recognizing how social and economic forces influence who gets sick, what disease afflict them, which treatments are available to them
- Appreciate how knowledge of a community can enhance their ability to provide care to people from that community, recognize the social factors influence to health and the influence of population health on the society
- Understand and describe the meanings of health and disease, risk factors and evaluation of population health
- understand the complex origins of global health problems and how specific strategies can be implemented to change both global health policy and health care delivery
- recognize the types of disparities that exist according to race, gender, geography, and other parameters
II. PSYCHOMOTORIC DOMAIN – SKILLS
- Apply the insights of social meicine to develop solutions that could improve the delivery of health care on local, national and global scales.
- Imagine system of medicine and public health that might best eclipse the burden of disease
- Examine the influence of the determinants of health as well as ways and possibilities for population preventive actions.
The way the classes are organized: Classes are organized in form of lectures and seminars. Students will actively participate in the course through seminars, which they will prepare in collaboration with the instructors. The lectures will engage students by actively reflecting on various issues. Seminars will prepare students for independent problem solving and integrative thinking. Through seminars, students will be introduced to the impacts of social determinants and their negative influence on health as well as preventive measures. Active participation of students throughout the course will be encouraged through independent reading and seminars. Students need to prepare the reading, which will be discussed in lectures and seminars. The final grade will be the sum of acquired points throughout the course and the final exam. Each student will be assessed on class participation during seminars (demonstrated knowledge, understanding, problem solving, concluding, etc.). Other student activities are also evaluated such as.