Each week is one lecture of about 2,000 words, with ten to fourteen key sources. Read the week first, then the sources. The questions at the end of a week assume you have read the page, not the whole library.

The shape of a week

1. The narrative. Two thousand words that argue a position and name the evidence. Allow two hours.
2. The sources. Each gets a note on what it found and why it matters here. Read at least four in full. Allow six hours.
3. The contested question. Every week names the place where the literature disagrees. Write a paragraph before you read the model answer.
4. The questions. Four multiple choice and one applied essay. Allow two hours.

What the source badges mean

A badge states how the source was read, not what kind of document it is. Full text means the text was read. Abstract means only the abstract and the figures were read, so claims are limited to what the abstract states. Landing page means the publication page was read and the document itself was not.

The policy documents

Four documents carry most of the argument, and all four are public: the 10 Year Health Plan, the Neighbourhood Health Framework, the neighbourhood health centre guidance and the design and performance specification. Read the framework in full. It is short, and its detail matters more than any summary of it.

Working across professions

Weeks 5 to 10 carry a joint task as well as a panel. The joint task is written for two or more professions to do together, and the disagreements it produces are the point. Do not answer it inside your own discipline: half the learning is in finding out that a colleague's answer is defensible and different. The practice log asks for four of these tasks written up from two professions' perspectives.

Honest limits

The evidence base for neighbourhood health as a distinct model is thin, because the model is new. Where the module claims an effect, it says which population was studied and how. Where the answer is not known, it says so.