Rethinking Community Medicine: Towards a Renaissance in Public Health

摘要

'Community Medicine' is a somewhat confusing term. However, it cannot be avoided since it is now used to describe both a branch of medicine that is formally recognized by the National Health Service (NHS) and a particular kind of University department. It has nothing to do with community in the sense of European Community nor is it a synonym, as is commonly and wrongly supposed, for general practice and related care, for 'medicine in the community' as opposed to hospital medicine. It deals with groups of people (populations) rather than individual patients. For the purpose of a brief and introductory explanation it can perhaps best be defined as the specialty that is concerned with the problems of medicine and society - and particularly with the changing pattern of accidents and illness and with the problems of NHS organization and health policy. Doctors who specialize in this field are known as 'community physicians' or 'specialists in community medicine'.