Student News

New Graduate Program in History of Public Health

Newly arrived immigrant receiving amedical examination on Ellis Island.

A joint program in the history of public health and medicine will be offered through the School of Public Health’s division of sociomedical sciences with classes beginning in September. The Program in the History of Public Health and Medicine will meld existing courses offered through sociomedical sciences, the Center for the Study of Society and Medicine, and the history department for students interested in pursuing either a master’s of public health or a Ph.D. in the history of public health and medicine.

David Rosner, Ph.D., M.S.P.H., professor of public health and co-director of the program, says the first students will enroll for the Fall 1998 term.

David Rothman, Ph.D., the Bernard Schoenberg Professor of Social Medicine and director of the Center for the Study of Society & Medicine at the College of Physicians & Surgeons, is also co-director. “It is the only program like this that I am aware of,” he says, noting that it will bring together academic historians and public health and medical school faculty.

Rosner hopes the program will help future policy makers use a historical approach in solving public health problems. “History is a way of understanding how we have gotten into certain positions,” he says.

More information on the Program in the History of Public Health and Medicine is available by calling Martina Lynch at (212) 304-7978 or by e-mail at hphm@columbia.edu.

Back to Student News