Prospective Students
With 7 specializations, 4 graduate degree programs, 1 undergraduate degree program, 5 divisions and scores of practice placement and residence opportunities, the College of Public Health offers you many options for customizing your public health studies at Ohio State.
Studying at one of the most comprehensive health science campuses in the nation, our students also have many options for dual and combined degree programs.
Many of our graduate public health students pursue international practice placements while in the program, and our public health alumni are found in organizations ranging from hospitals to private business to government agencies. We even offer a public health program for experienced professionals.
Our health administration alumni have been recognized as having one of the most successful alumni organizations by the American College for Healthcare Executives as well as The Ohio State University Alumni Association.
Add to the fact that Ohio State is set in the heart of the state capital, and you begin to realize the many opportunities that await you.
Join the college today, and make your mark with global significance and local impact.
Degree Programs
The OSU College of Public Health offers four graduate degree programs, and one undergraduate degree program giving students a wide range of options based on their interests and career objectives. They are:
Master of Public Health
Master of Health Administration
Master of Science
Doctor of Philosophy
Bachelor of Science in Public Health
Graduate Specializations
The college offers several specializations plus the opportunity to pursue an interdisciplinary specialization in global health. These specializations are offered to students in the Master of Public Health, Master of Science, and Doctor of Philosophy degree programs.
Biomedical Informatics
Biomedical informatics is the interdisciplinary field that studies and pursues the effective uses of biomedical data, information, and knowledge for scientific inquiry, problem solving and decision making, motivated by efforts to improve human health.
Biostatistics
Biostatistics is one of the primary fields in the science and practice of public health, relating statistical information to concrete health issues as they affect human populations. Biostatisticians often collaborate with public health and clinical professionals to research and analyze problems in a wide range of health sciences, providing the evidence needed to make critical clinical and policy decisions.
Environmental Health Sciences
Environmental Health Sciences is focused on chemical, physical, and biological agents in the environment that affect human health. Its multidisciplinary scope spans the continuum from the agent source to contamination and human exposure that result in toxicity, infection, or other adverse human health impact. The profession examines both individual and population-level susceptibility factors and interventions that can prevent disease.
Epidemiology
Epidemiology focuses on patterns of disease, disability, and injury and applies that information to the control of health problems. Epidemiologists quantify the exposure-disease relationship in humans and offer the possibility of altering that risk through intervention. Epidemiologic research provides the basis for significant public health decisions, such as those involving tobacco use or HIV/AIDS, well before individual disease mechanisms are understood.
Health Behavior and Health Promotion
The goal of Health Behavior and Health Promotion is to enable people to increase control over and improve their health. The field of health promotion seeks to develop the capacity of communities, organizations, and individuals to establish conditions in which people can be healthy. Practitioners work with organizations in the development of programs, policies, and environments which enable health.
Health Services Management and Policy
The American health care system is growing dramatically and now employs more professionals than any other industry in the United States. This specialization provides students with an understanding of the various factors affecting health care policy formation, quality of care, patient safety, financial viability of health care systems, the role of health technology, and ways of improving the delivery of care.
Clinical Translational Science
This specialization is intended for clinicians who would like additional training in the methods most applicable for research in applied clinical settings. It draws on the tools of biostatistics and epidemiology along with such important considerations as law and ethics. A combination of classes, seminars, and mentored individual study will help you develop your ability to function as an independent investigator.
Interdisciplinary Specialization in Global Health
In addition to majoring in one or more of the specializations listed and summarized above, students may add an interdisciplinary specialization in Global Health to their plan of study. This is a collaborative program involving the Health Sciences colleges and focuses beyond domestic to include international issues that affect health.
Veterinary Public Health
There is a great societal need for public health professionals who can address the problems of infectious diseases transmissible from animals to humans, food safety and food security, emergency response and preparedness, as well as animal health and biomedical research. The Colleges of Public Health and Veterinary Medicine collaborate to offer this specialization, certified by the American College of Veterinary Preventive Medicine.
Program for Experienced Professionals
Students in the MPH Program for Experienced Professionals (PEP) do not specialize, other than through their use of electives and their choices for the practicum and culminating experience. The specific PEP course requirements recognize the needs and interests of more experienced students, with emphasis on general preparation for positions of leadership in public health.
Undergraduate Specializations
The Bachelor of Science in Public Health offers two undergraduate specializations, Public Health Sociology and Environmental Public Health
