Doctors' understanding of the specialty of Public Health Medicine: a survey of general practitioners and junior hospital doctors.

The Acheson report recommended that the new name for Community Medicine should be Public Health Medicine and that a new group of doctors with responsibility for communicable disease control be established. Three years after the report, general practitioners and junior hospital doctors in one health district were surveyed regarding their understanding of the specialty. This study identified some confusion about the titles and functions of doctors in Public Health Medicine. It is important to understand this problem and make efforts to rectify it.