Emergency medicine and public health: new steps in old directions.
Emergency medicine and public health have opportunities to interact in at least 4 areas: surveillance of diseases, injuries, and health risks; monitoring health care access; delivering clinical preventive services; and developing policies to protect and improve the public's health. Recent, cross-cutting initiatives and innovations in these 4 areas follow pathways first explored more than a generation ago and provide an important impetus for future work. An analysis of recent contributions also points to various obstacles and challenges that must be addressed to take full advantage of existing and rapidly developing ties between emergency medicine and public health. The connections between these 2 fields will continue to create important partnership opportunities and the strong possibility of achieving new benefits for patients, the public, and the professionals who serve them.
Pollock
D A
DA
National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Atlanta, GA 30341-3724, USA. dpollack@cdc.gov
Lowery
D W
DW
O'brien
P M
PM
D004635:Emergency Medicine / Q000639:trends*; D005544:Forecasting; D006297:Health Services Accessibility / Q000639:trends; D006302:Health Services Research / Q000639:trends; D006801:Humans; D011159:Population Surveillance; D011314:Preventive Health Services / Q000639:trends; D011634:Public Health / Q000639:trends*; D014481:United States