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Indian Supercourse Network in Epidemiology - Development and Evaluation

Lovalekar, Mita T (2008) Indian Supercourse Network in Epidemiology - Development and Evaluation. Doctoral Dissertation, University of Pittsburgh. (Unpublished)

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Abstract

There are many advantages to using locally produced health information, such as its cultural appropriateness, geographic specificity, and flexibility. The Indian Supercourse is an online repository of lectures in Epidemiology, written by authors in India, on topics of particular interest to teachers and students in India.The purpose of this dissertation is to describe the planning, development and evaluation of the Indian Supercourse Network. The Indian Supercourse Network has 6,000 faculty members in India, and more than 200 epidemiology lectures written by authors in India. Evaluation of the Indian Supercourse Network included an assessment of utilization of these educational materials in India using page views measured by web statistics analysis software. The main hypothesis compared page views from India, between the Indian Supercourse and the Main Supercourse. The results of the Wilcoxon Rank-Sum test showed that there were significantly more page views from India to the Indian Supercourse as compared to the Main Supercourse (p < 0.0001). This means that users in India prefer to use the Indian Supercourse more than the Main Supercourse. This may be because information in the Indian Supercourse is more pertinent to the epidemiology education needs of users in India. In contrast, there were significantly more page views from non-Indian countries to the Main Supercourse as compared to the Indian Supercourse (p < 0.0001). Interestingly, there was no significant difference (p = 0.0642) in total page views from all countries considered together, between the Indian Supercourse and the Main Supercourse.Public Health Significance - In India, there is a lack of an adequate system for formal epidemiology education. The Indian Supercourse has made epidemiology education available to everyone interested in learning epidemiology in India. The results of this study have shown that the Indian Supercourse is being utilized by people in India. Information contained on the Indian Supercourse website can eventually be disseminated across the digital divide via low-bandwidth methods and the postal system in India.


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Details

Item Type: University of Pittsburgh ETD
Status: Unpublished
Creators/Authors:
CreatorsEmailPitt UsernameORCID
Lovalekar, Mita Tmita.lovalekar@gmail.com
ETD Committee:
TitleMemberEmail AddressPitt UsernameORCID
Committee ChairLaPorte, RonaldRonlaporte@aol.com
Committee MemberSekikawa, Akiraakira@pitt.eduAKIRA
Committee MemberRycheck, Russell Rulerrrteach@pitt.eduRRRTEACH
Committee MemberSonger, Thomas Jtjs@pitt.eduTJS
Committee MemberChang, Yue-Fangyuc2@pitt.eduYUC2
Date: 29 September 2008
Date Type: Completion
Defense Date: 23 July 2008
Approval Date: 29 September 2008
Submission Date: 27 July 2008
Access Restriction: No restriction; Release the ETD for access worldwide immediately.
Institution: University of Pittsburgh
Schools and Programs: School of Public Health > Epidemiology
Degree: PhD - Doctor of Philosophy
Thesis Type: Doctoral Dissertation
Refereed: Yes
Uncontrolled Keywords: digital divide; distance learning; utilization; dissemination; Internet; developing country
Other ID: http://etd.library.pitt.edu/ETD/available/etd-07272008-235916/, etd-07272008-235916
Date Deposited: 10 Nov 2011 19:54
Last Modified: 15 Nov 2016 13:47
URI: http://d-scholarship.pitt.edu/id/eprint/8656

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