WRITING ASSIGNMENT
Our writing
assignment is to conduct library research on a disease or health condition that
poses a significant public health threat, and that interests you. You will
select a disease or condition, search the published scientific literature, and
prepare a concise Fact Sheet that describes the disease. This assignment
is worth 25 points.
What is a fact
sheet?
A fact sheet
provides meaningful information about a topic in a format that is extremely
brief and easy to read. Experts use them to summarize the “state of the art”
about the topic. Fact sheets are used to provide an overview, to provide
recommendations and advice, and sometimes to convince the reader to change
their behavior. The focus is on providing what is essential and presenting the
information in a way that is visually appealing and accessible.
Examples of fact
sheets
Examples can be
found on the following web sites:
New York State Department of Health Communicable Diseases website:**
http://www.health.state.ny.us/nysdoh/communicable_diseases/en/index.htm
This site provides an alphabetized list of
fact sheets about various communicable diseases. These fact sheets should give
you a sense of what content to include in your fact sheet.
Centers for Disease
Control Division of Parasitic Disease website:
http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dpd/parasites/chagasdisease/factsht_chagas_disease.htm
This site contains a good example of a fact
sheet geared towards a specific audience: someone infected with the disease.
Try to get a sense of how to phrase your fact sheet for different possible
audiences.
Fact Sheet Format
for This Assignment
·
The fact
sheet should be between 3 and 4 double-spaced typed pages long, not including
the reference list.
·
Use
Times New Roman font with 11 point font or larger.
·
Some
information is more clearly communicated using figures or tables, and you
should make use of this in your assignment. Please note, however, that the page
limit should not exceed 4 pages.
[continued on next page]
** To open these links,
right click on the URL, and “open hyperlink”
[Fact Sheet Format, continued]
·
The fact
sheet must be based primarily on at least three recently (within last 5 years)
published review articles of your topic (from public health or medical
journals). You may augment this information with data from websites or other
publications, but published reviews will form the basis of your research.
Textbooks can be used to gain a basic understanding of your chosen disease or
condition.
·
All
references used to create your fact sheet should be cited in the text and
referenced at the end. The 3 key reviews should be starred.
·
We will
use bibliographic format for your reference list as it appears on the following
fact sheet:
https://www.apha.org/-/media/files/pdf/factsheets/advancing_health_equity.ashx
·
You may also
use other bibliographic management software, such as Endnote.
·
Note
that the final copy of all submissions will be archived in the MPH files.
Steps in Preparing your Fact Sheet
1. Choose a topic. The focus is a disease or
condition that affects public health of humans. It may help to explore texts of
infectious disease, chronic disease, or public health in general.
2. Conduct a search of the literature. You can begin
with the Elmhurst University Library website’s databases, or use search engines
such as PubMed (the NIH’s site), Google.scholar, etc. This will involve clearly
deciding your question, creating a search strategy, and identifying “key words”
and “subject headings.”
3. Limit the scope of the topic. After
researching your topic to get a sense of its scope, you may decide to study the
disease in general (for example, “heart disease”) or limit your topic by
focusing on a specific group according to race, age, gender, or geographic
location. (For example, “heart disease in women”, or “heart disease in
African-Americans”, or “heart disease in Chicago, IL.”) If there are too many review articles on your topic you
need to limit the scope of your fact sheet further or select another
disease/condition. If there are not enough reviews, you may want to check in
with the Professor or a GSI about your topic.
4. Keep the audience in mind. Fact sheets are
written towards a specific audience. For this assignment, you should target
your fact sheet to a fellow Elmhurst College student. Medical jargon is not
appropriate, but there are virtually no topics or concepts that cannot be
explained in a few sentences.
5. Focus on Reviews. Identify all published
reviews on your topic during the past 5 years. List the 10 most recent reviews,
turn them in, evaluate. Select the best 3 reviews.
6. Create a form to compare the results of the
reviews you selected for each question listed below. A grid listing the
questions on one axis and the reviews on the other can be very effective. The
purpose of this is to help you organize your thoughts and to identify gaps the
information you have assembled.
7. Summarize your results. What is consistent?
What is controversial and why? What is not known at all?
Content of Fact Sheet
The following questions should be answered in
your assignment. For some topics, these will not be appropriate, but if that is
the case, be sure to clearly state that there is a gap in the
literature—otherwise, we will think that you have missed something. This list
is written in the order information usually appears in a fact sheet. If you
decide to deviate from this, you should have an exceptionally clear and compelling reason for doing so.
a) What
is the name of the disease or condition? How is it defined and diagnosed?
b) Why
is it a problem? Describe its symptoms, morbidity, and mortality.
c) What
are the major risk factors of the disease?
Is there a known agent or cause of the disease? If the cause is not
completely understood, what are the leading candidates for causes?
d) What
populations are at risk for this disease or condition? Does the disease vary by
subgroups? How? Populations refer to
groups that can be described according to their varying characteristics, such
as age, sex, education, income, or geographic location.
e) What
is the incidence/prevalence of the disease?
If there are data on incidence and prevalence, include these as well.
f) How
is the disease treated?
g) How
is the disease prevented?
Deadlines
1. 6/22/24 – Your final review sheet,
complete with all references, is due.
Learning objectives for Fact Sheet Assignment
1. Develop
skills in information literacy (ability to search for, assess, and evaluate
sources of information) and critical thinking.
2. Analyze
and compare published reviews of scientific literature about a health condition
to determine what is known, what remains unknown, and areas of controversy.
3. Summarize
findings into a concise fact sheet aimed at a specific target audience.
A note on writing
For many students, particularly science
students, this assignment may be first substantial writing assignment you have
completed for a long time. Please note that the clarity with which you present
the information will be considered in the success of this assignment. It is not
a bad idea to have someone edit your fact sheet before you submit it,
especially if you are not practiced in college-level writing.
!*Note from me: I have included a rough draft of the fact sheet however, I still need a minimum of three sources from *peer reviewed journal articles* and also the note from the professor after he read my draft was this: “Good start. I like your graphics. You could use more summaries, maybe more bullet points.
Some of your literature sources are not peer reviewed. That’s okay as long as you have three.”
