SYLLABUS | PH555x | IMPROVING GLOBAL HEALTH: FOCUSING ON QUALITY AND SAFETY
Faculty Lead: Ashish Jha, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health
Course Description
This course will offer an introduction to the emerging field of global healthcare quality. Over the past two decades there has been an increasing realization that in order for healthcare to improve population health, it must be safe, effective, and reliably delivered. Despite this realization, the quality of care that the world’s citizens receive is not as good as it can and should be. The human toll of poor quality healthcare is substantial. The most recent data suggest that poor quality healthcare is likely one of the top causes of morbidity and mortality in the world. While there are a number of initiatives to improve health care quality in the United States, broad evidence from other high-income countries and emerging evidence from low and middle-income countries suggest that a global focus is needed.
Learning Objectives
We all agree that quality is important – but what is it? How do we define it? How do we measure it? And most importantly, how might we make it better? In this course, you will learn:
• The importance of focusing on quality for improving population health
• A framework for understanding healthcare quality
• Approaches to quality measurement
• The role of information and communication technology in quality improvement
• Tools and contextual knowledge for quality improvement
Grading
Three categories of graded assignments exist in this course:
Homework is worth 60% of the final course grade. Homework questions appear after nearly all videos in this course. Be sure to pay close attention to all of the questions related to each video and answer all of them to earn all homework points.
Participation is worth 20% of the final course grade. Your level of participation is self-reported at the end of each week. You will indicate if you did or did not participate in the discussion forum and answer the poll questions that appear frequently throughout the course.
A final project is worth 20% of the final course grade. The final project is a short writing assignment. Your grade will be based upon your completion of the assignment as well as your review and evaluation of the response from three other learners in the course. You will be randomly assigned other learners' responses to evaluate after you submit your own response. You will be provided a rubric with details for evaluating your own work, and the work of other learners. Your submission will be graded by two other learners.
This short writing assignment will be submitted using the edX Open Response Assessment (ORA) tool. If you have questions about how to use this tool, see the online documentation from edX, or you may also post a question about the tool in the Help Thread of the discussion forum addressed to the course staff using [STAFF] at the beginning of your post. We will send a reminder about this prior to Week 8.
To earn an ID-Verified Certificate of completion, you must earn at least a 70% on all graded items within the course. You can find your score on the Progress page.
A Note about Grading
The edX platform will count your score on all graded assignments as a 0 until you work through each one within each lesson in the course. For example, a perfect score on Lesson 1 will still leave you with a very low score in the course because all of the other graded assignments are registered as a 0. Keep working through the assignments and you will see your score improve each week.
Course Duration
Our course opens with introductory information and all of the Week 1 content on Tuesday, June 27th.
Each new week of the course will open on Tuesdays, with the exception of Week 2, which will open on Wednesday, July 5. See the course outline below for a list of dates each week will open.
The last day to register for an edX ID-verified certificate is August 22, 2017.
The deadline to complete all graded assignments and earn an edX ID-verified certificate is September 5, 2017.
ID-Verified Certificate
To earn an ID-Verified Certificate of completion, you must earn at least a 70% on all graded items within the course. You can find your score on the Progress page.
EdX provides certificates to those who have passed the course and verified their identity. If you pass the course you are eligible for a Verified Certificate. Your certificate will indicate you have successfully completed the course, but will not include a specific letter grade.
You can find out more about self-paced courses and certification in the EdX Learner's Guide.
The last day to register for an edX ID-verified certificate is August 22, 2017.
The deadline to complete all graded assignments and earn an edX ID-verified certificate is September 5, 2017.
Readings
Additional readings appear at the end of each week within the course. All readings will give you a better understanding of the topics discussed each week. These readings are optional and are not required to answer graded homework questions.
Discussion Questions
Discussion questions are designed to incite participant discussion and in-depth exploration of course content. These questions will be monitored by course staff. The course team feels strongly that the quality of this course is highly dependent on the input students provide to one another.
Please consider the following when you post:
Guidelines
• Stay focused. All viewpoints are welcome, but comments should remain relevant to the course material.
• Be respectful. Personal attacks, profanity, and aggressive behavior are prohibited. Instigating arguments in a disrespectful way is also prohibited.
• Tell the truth. Spreading misleading or false information is prohibited.
• No spam. Repeated posting of content in a counter-productive manner is prohibited — this includes posts aggressively promoting services or products.
• Posts should be written in your own words. If you include a quote or reference, when possible also provide a citation (book, URL, etc).
• Participate! You will get out of the discussions what you put into them.
• Before posting, search the Discussion for similar questions or comments. You can always respond and/or click on the green plus button to upvote a post.
• If you disagree with a post, respond using evidence and reasoning instead of personal attacks.
• Before posting a comment, consider: would you say it to someone’s face? If not, we encourage that you revise it.
• Use correct grammar and spell-check your posts. Also, please do not use ALL CAPS.
• This course is about a medical topic; however, please do not solicit other course participants or course moderators for medical advice within the forum.
Logistics
• Please limit your posts/responses to 200 words or less (by request of edX).
• Use the search and engagement tools (upvote, follow for updates, flag for misuse) on the Discussion Home to find and contribute to the conversations.
• A blue star on a post means a member of the course staff has endorsed it.
• If you see an inappropriate post, flag it instead of adding your own commentary.
Please note that Harvard University does not endorse products or services, and HarvardX discourages endorsement of specific products or services in course discussions.
Asking Questions and Giving Feedback
If you have questions about the course content you can submit those questions in the Help thread of the discussion forum addressed to the course staff using [STAFF] at the beginning of your post.
If you have general feedback about the course, you can post it in the course feedback thread of the discussion forum.
Course Outline
Week 1: Burden (opens June 27, 2017)
Week 2: Measurement (opens July 5, 2017)
Week 3: Standards (opens July 11, 2017)
Week 4: Improvement (opens July 18, 2017)
Week 5: IT and Data (opens July 25, 2017)
Week 6: Management (opens August 1, 2017)
Week 7: Patients (opens August 8, 2017)
Week 8: Public Systems (opens August 15, 2017)
The last day to register for an edX ID-verified certificate is August 22, 2017.
The deadline to complete all graded assignments and earn an edX ID-verified certificate is September 5, 2017.
Honor Code
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Research Statement
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For more information about the course, and to share the course on your own social media channels, you can revisit details on the course registration website.