Technical Guidance
You may want to observe the following when preparing your work:
1) Note this work is a report – not an essay. You can use sub-headings and graphics.
2) Use spacing 1½ or double
3) Font size 12 in Arial or Times New Roman – use one and not mixing both. You can use another that is clear and easy to read
3) Anonymous marking – do not include your name on the work because we do anonymous marking. You may include your student ID number.
4) Title – make sure your work has a title that reflects what the paper is about.
5) You can include diagrams and tables in the main body of your work (graphics)
6) Use the Harvard referencing style correctly in the text and in the References list. Check the Harvard referencing guide and resources and if you are not sure. Work not correctly referenced at Masters (Level 7) should be given back to the author to correct. Hence, such work may not pass.
7) Structure – in addition to the main guidelines suggested below, you may want to think of the structure of your paper as having the following sections: Title, Introduction, Discussion of the Problem and its Implications, Critique of the Interventions to the Problem, Recommendations and Conclusion. References list of all items used and cited in the work should be given at the end of the work.
Assessment Description
Write a 4000 word report of an evidence informed initiative to improve health and healthcare for a particular population group in a London borough or any other chosen city. Students should use the approach of developing an evidence-informed campaign and advocacy report to convince commissioners to take up the health issue. Therefore, students should choose health issues that are of great concern in causing health inequalities among population groups within London boroughs or other cities. They should pay special attention to health inequalities affecting the population group and key factors that explain them. Thus, the work should focus on a specific health issue in relation to a population group; seeking to highlight the key factors and impact of the health issue on the population group and what the borough or city health commissioners can do differently from current interventions to improve health and healthcare for the population group. Students who prefer to study health issues among population groups within London or New York should choose a specific patch or borough.
The coursework will have to use public health and urban health reporting materials. It will indicate how the city context influences the urban health issue under investigation. It will also have to consider how current policy and legislation present opportunities and problems to tackle the issue.
Think of this as a campaign and advocacy contribution to the development of a multi-agency, department of public / urban health or a local authority health service-led initiative to improve health and health care for a particular population group in a London borough or any other city. Imagine that you are the spokesperson for the campaign and advocacy group which hopes to get an issue taken up by those who commission services. You are trying to ensure that a specific problem on a specific patch is included or given a higher or different emphasis from that in recent planning in that borough or city. It should help people from very different political standing points understand the issue. It must show that you have a grasp of the socio-economic and planning context within which service commissioners operate and that health needs have to be prioritised.
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Content Guide
You can organise your paper using the following suggestions – these are for general guidance only and should be used with imagination. Please note that this is not a structure guide – therefore you should not have the following points chronologically as they are in your report. What this guide provides is the kind of content you have to think about rather than the structure of the report. If you need a more fomalised guide on structure, please refer to point 7 on the Technical Guidance above.
1. Report Title – provide a clear academic title that shows the health issue your are studying, the target population group and the London borough or city the work is based on.
2. Introduction
Highlight the health issue the paper is studying. Try to find an arresting quotation, example, paragraph-length case study to get right to the point. Provide an outline of what the reader will find in each of the sections (singposting) of your work.
3. Data / Information on the health issue on a London patch or another city in relation to the population group chosen
Give an overview of the data / information produced at local level on your topic. Include data / information produced by health and local authority professionals and by community groups. To ensure that you have digested this material, you must ask yourself how useful the documentation is in presenting the basis for EVIDENCE-BASED planning. What sort of hard and soft information does it provide on socio-demographic and epidemiologic aspects in relation to the target population and the health issue? Use this data to link to the next section of your Essay to describe and discuss the health issue in respect to the chosen population group in the London borough or another city you have chosen.
4. The London / city context and background of the health issue chosen
Show how features of the city background and context impact on the issue you have chosen: patterns of health & illness (epidemiologic evidence); aspects of the social and economic environment (the social health determinants). Pay particular attention to data (epidemiological trends) that explain the extent of this problem in the borough / city and population group chosen, including the social determinants of health that influence this issue in the city or the London patch you are studying.
5. Application of London patch / city’s health strategy
Identify and critique the intervention/s developed to tackle the health issue in the London patch / city chosen. What does it say about relevant intervention services or integrated care (between acute, community & primary services)? What does it say about joint-working between local authority (especially social services and housing depts) & health care sectors)? What does it say about finance and other resources?
6. The social science context.
Throughout the Essay and where you think appropriate, show how social science materials (particularly theory) help you to make sense and inform your critical thinking of the issues you have investigated, for example materials on urban health crisis, urban health penalty, inequalities in health and the constraints within which you have identified the feasibility of your recommendations.
Recommendations and Conclusion
Formulate and justify any recommendations to better address your issue. Show how your recommendations relate to the London patch / city’s health strategy, and in relation to the population group the paper studied.
Underline the main points and key evidence discussed about the health issue you chose and relate them to the broader content of the module.