scholarly journals The Creation of the Faculty of Community Medicine (now the Faculty of Public Health Medicine) of the Royal Colleges of Physicians ofthe United Kingdom

1997 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 93-105 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. D. Warren
2007 ◽  
Vol 30 (4) ◽  
pp. 36
Author(s):  
M. L. Russell ◽  
L. McIntyre

We compared the work settings and “community-oriented clinical practice” of Community Medicine (CM) specialists and family physicians/general practitioners (FP). We conducted secondary data analysis of the 2004 National Physician Survey (NPS) to examine main work setting and clinical activity reported by 154 CM (40% of eligible CM in Canada) and 11,041 FP (36% of eligible FP in Canada). Text data from the specialist questionnaire related to “most common conditions that you treat” were extracted from the Master database for CM specialists, and subjected to thematic analysis and coded. CM specialists were more likely than FP to engage in “community medicine/public health” (59.7% vs 15.3%); while the opposite was found for primary care (13% vs. 78.2%). CM specialists were less likely to indicate a main work setting of private office/clinic/community health centre/community hospital than were FP (13.6% vs. 75.6%). Forty-five percent of CM provided a response to “most common conditions treated” with the remainder either leaving the item blank or indicating that they did not treat individual patients. The most frequently named conditions in rank order were: psychiatric disorders; public health program/activity; respiratory problems; hypertension; and metabolic disorders (diabetes). There is some overlap in the professional activities and work settings of CM specialists and FP. The “most commonly treated conditions” suggest that some CM specialists may be practicing primary care as part of the Royal College career path of “community-oriented clinical practice.” However the “most commonly treated conditions” do not specifically indicate an orientation of that practice towards “an emphasis on health promotion and disease prevention” as also specified by the Royal College for that CM career path. This raises questions about the appropriateness of the current training requirements and career paths as delineated for CM specialists by the Royal College of Physicians & Surgeons of Canada. Bhopal R. Public health medicine and primary health care: convergent, divergent, or parallel paths? J Epidemiol Community Health 1995; 49:113-6. Pettersen BJ, Johnsen R. More physicians in public health: less public health work? Scan J Public Health 2005; 33:91-8. Stanwell-Smith R. Public health medicine in transition. J Royal Society of Medicine 2001; 94(7):319-21.


2021 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Emalie Rosewarne ◽  
Michael Moore ◽  
Wai-Kwan Chislett ◽  
Alexandra Jones ◽  
Kathy Trieu ◽  
...  

Abstract Background Public health advocacy strategies facilitate policy change by bringing key health issues to the forefront of public and political discourse, influencing decision-makers and public opinion, and increasing policy demand. The Victorian Salt Reduction Partnership (VSRP) was established in 2014 in response to inadequate government action to improve population diets in Australia. This study aimed to evaluate the success of the VSRP’s advocacy strategy in achieving policy change. Methods Documentation of VSRP activities and outputs were collected, and semi-structured interviews conducted as part of a comprehensive process evaluation. For this study, the Kotter Plus 10-step public health advocacy evaluation framework was used to guide data extraction, analysis, and synthesis. Results A sense of urgency for salt reduction was generated by producing evidence and outlining the potential impact of a state-based salt reduction programme. This enabled the creation of a coalition with diverse skills and expertise, which facilitated the development of an innovative and collaborative advocacy action plan. A clear change vision was established, but communication of the vision to decision-makers was lacking, which reduced the impact of the programme as decision-makers were not provided with a clear incentive for policy change. As a result, while programme outputs were achieved, these did not translate to achieving broader strategic goals during a limited-term intervention in a political climate unconcerned with salt. Conclusions The Kotter Plus 10-step framework was a useful tool for evaluating the success of the VSRP advocacy strategy. The framework enabled the identification of key strengths, including the creation of the guiding coalition, and areas where efforts could be improved in future similar strategies, such as effective communication within partnerships and to decision-makers, to better influence policy and improve public health impact.


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