300092 Women's Health in International Perspectives (S) (SoSe 2016)

Background:

This course takes a critical and interdisciplinary approach in understanding women’s health
in international and comparative perspective. Taking into consideration women’s entire life
span, the course will dissect women’s health and its intersection with various social
conditions such as women’s unequal access to education, denial of capacity building
opportunities, lack of economic resources and vulnerability to violence and abuse. The
course will also evaluate the health care services, programs and policies that affect women’s
health directly and indirectly.

Description:

This course is designed to provide substantive knowledge on women’s health issues related
to puberty, fertility, pregnancy, maternity, motherhood and menopause. The course
participants will learn the intersection of overall environmental, social and political conditions
that influence women’s physical, mental, and reproductive health in a given society.

Objectives:

The primary objective of this course is to develop a scientific understanding of the
participants on women’s health in a critical and comparative perspective. The course will
develop competencies of the participants to analyse the:

scope and magnitude of health problems for women with regard to their general and
reproductive health, with a focus across the life span, and including infectious, chronic and
disabling conditions;
women’s health problems relative to social conditions such as gender discrimination and
health inequalities; and
improvement of women’s health conditions by designing culturally appropriate health care
interventions within the framework of the Millennium Developmental Goals.

Bibliography

Kuh, D. & Hardy, R. A life course Approach to Women’s Health.

Wethington, E. An overview of the life course perspective: Implication for health and nutrition. Journal of Nutrition Education and Behaviour (37, 115-120.

Patel, V., Rodrigues, M. Desonza, N. Gender, poverty and postnatal depression. A study of
mothers in Goa, India. Psychiatry. 2002. 159(1).

Health disparities beginning in Childhood,: A life course Perspective. Paediatrics. 2009
(124(3).

Ahmad, S., Creanga, A., Gillespie, D., Tsui, A. (2010). Economic status, education and
empowerment: Implication for maternal health services utilization in developing countries.
PLos One. 5(6).

Fergusson, D. Bodon, J. Horwood, J. Abortion among young women and subsequent life
outcomes. Perspective on sexual and reproductive health. 39(1).

Phyllida Travis, Sara Bennett, et al. Overcoming health-systems constraints to achieve the
Millennium Development Goals. Lancet, 364.

Judith Wuest, and Marilyn Merritt-Gray, Illuminating Social Determinants Of Women’s Health
Using Grounded Theory. Healthcare for Women International, 23, 749-808.

S George P Schmid, Claudia Garcia Moreno, Paul FA Van Look. Sxual and reproductive
health: a matter of life and death* Anna Glasier, A Metin Gülmezoglu