Public Health Nutrition

The master’s degree programme in Public Health Nutrition is a joint degree programme of the Departments of Nutritional, Food and Consumer Studies and Nursing and Health Care and focuses on the interface between nutrition and health sciences. The linking of the two disciplines is intended to lead to new approaches to resolving increasing and urgent health issues among the general population today.

The degree programme is based on biological/medical sciences, social sciences, and epidemiology. It recognises and demonstrates links between health, nutrition, and other health-related behaviour and identifies risk groups and prevention potential to prevent or treat lifestyle-induced disease with measures aimed at the general population.

The master’s degree programme in Public Health Nutrition is aimed at graduates Food and Consumer Studies or related degree programmes who are interested in studying and researching issues in nutrition with regard to health and the general population, are keen to look beyond their subject area, and would like to tread new paths in the prevention and treatment of lifestyle-associated disease.

The standard duration of the full-time degree programme is four semesters. There is also the option of a part-time degree programme completed over six semesters. In both programmes, formal instruction is given mostly from Mondays to Wednesdays, leaving Thursdays and Fridays free for students to complete their own required independent work.

In the second and third semesters, students undertake a research project in which they study current research questions in small groups and develop solutions for health-related challenges.

The master’s degree programme equips you to plan, implement, and assess interventions for the general population in prevention and health promotion in the field of public health nutrition.It also enables you to develop new approaches to the prevention and treatment of poor diet, provide advice on policy in the senior civil service, and assume design and decision-making roles in nationally and internationally-operating enterprises, political institutions, and in non-governmental organisations. A further option, taken by many of our graduates, is to take up a career in research via a doctoral position.