Undergraduate - UnitBND3082 - Public health nutrition

This unit entry is for students who completed this unit in 2014 only. For students planning to study the unit, please refer to the unit indexes in the the current edition of the Handbook. If you have any queries contact the managing faculty for your course or area of study.

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6 points, SCA Band 2, 0.125 EFTSL

Refer to the specific census and withdrawal dates for the semester(s) in which this unit is offered, or view unit timetables.

Level	Undergraduate
Faculty	Faculty of Medicine, Nursing and Health Sciences
Organisational Unit	Department of Nutrition and Dietetics
Offered	Clayton Second semester 2014 (Day)
Coordinator(s)	Dr Claire Palermo

Synopsis

This unit will review the concepts and approaches of population health in the context of nutrition. The content will explore current public health nutrition practice issues related to priority issues such as obesity, food security and the food supply. A systems based, health promotion framework to addressing priority nutrition issues will be discussed and current public health nutrition practice will be evaluated. Students will explore the political foundations of public health policy in Australia including the impact of public health policies and will develop skills in policy analysis and public health advocacy. This unit will provide students with the foundations knowledge in preparation for the development of skills of the practice of public health nutrition. The key theme explored in this unit is Theme 2: Determinants and influences on population health and nutrition coupled with partial integration of content from Theme 4: Food: from science to systems.

Outcomes

On completion of this unit students will be able to:

Describe the current key public health nutrition priorities and issues in Australia and the policy frameworks that support these.
Appraise the political, environmental, social and economic influences on public health nutrition goals and practice.
Explore opportunities for beneficial social, environmental and nutritional change to the Australian food supply.
Evaluate how public health policy may influence food consumption and nutrition status.
Apply a socio-ecological, systems based approach to understanding and managing population nutrition issues.
Employ best practice frameworks and approaches for planning, implementation and evaluation of these issues in the development of nutrition interventions.
Explain the use of and process of public health advocacy and apply the advocacy framework to a current public health nutrition issue.

Assessment

Mid-semester test (20%)
Policy analysis assignment (group) (40%)
Advocacy discussion paper (individual) (20%) with class debate (ungraded)
Local food systems map (individual) (20%)

Chief examiner(s)

Dr Claire Palermo

Workload requirements

Week 1 - 4 x 6 hours workshops,
Weeks 2 to 9 - 3 hours per week (interactive classes and tutorials) ^ hours self-directed study.

This unit applies to the following area(s) of study

Nutrition and dietetics

Prerequisites

BND1002 or equivalent