MD-Master of Public Health

Balance your career with a joint MPH-MD degree

Students admitted to the Indiana University School of Medicine, at any of the nine IUSM campuses, are eligible to apply to the joint MPH-MD program at the IU Richard M. Fairbanks School of Public Health at IUPUI.

This degree will prepare you to balance your career between direct medical care of individuals and public health practice within communities. It will also expand your career options by making you more marketable for a wide variety of careers (i.e. global health, hospital leadership, health policy, health research, nonprofit management, environmental health, and refugee and immigrant health). The MPH-MD program is designed for completion in five years.

Jen Walthall

I was armed at graduation to begin service as a public health practitioner for individual patients, scholarship development and program building.

Jen Walthall, MD, MPH, Family and Social Services Administration (FSSA) Secretary

Admissions

Medical students who are interested in pursuing the joint MPH-MD degree must apply and be admitted to the Fairbanks School of Public Health through the dual degree application supplement. Once accepted you will be asked to complete an IU application through the Online Graduate and Professional Admissions Application.

Students in the MPH-MD program may be considered for limited stipends to offset some of the tuition expenses of the public health coursework. You are encouraged to apply to the MPH program the spring semester before you wish to begin your public health course work; however, arrangements will be made to facilitate completion of the joint degree program at any point during your medical education.

See the MPH-MD admissions criteria

Alumni Career Profiles

To help our prospective students understand the possibilities a degree in Public Health offers, we've asked several alumni to share the career opportunities they have had since graduating. Browse the alumni career profiles to see what our graduates are up to.

Curriculum

Fairbanks School of Public Health at IUPUI and the Indiana University School of Medicine have developed an innovative coordinated MPH-MD curriculum that integrates medicine and public health training. Students learn key public health topics, including issues related to environmental health, infectious disease control, biostatistics, disease prevention and health promotion, epidemiological studies, and health policy.

To make it easy to complete two degrees in such a short time, up to 12 credits of the total 45 MPH credits are shared from a list of pre-approved MD 4th-year elective credits. The MPH-MD begins with the first three core public health courses that are taken online during their first summer term. The remaining classes are completed during the fall and spring semesters, typically between the third and fourth years of medical school; however, other arrangements can be made. To incorporate experiential learning, a final public health internship and capstone course are required. 

Students in the MPH-MD dual degree program will have the option of having a global health focus where they spend a year in IUSM’s program in Kenya participating in an ongoing research project while also getting exposure to clinical care in Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital and its clinics. During that year, they will complete their required MPH coursework online.

MPH-MD students who began the program summer 2022 and beyond will be required to pass the Certified Public Health exam to meet graduation requirements.