Population and public health in Australian general practice: changes, challenges and opportunities

Expansion of the public health role of general practice is being promoted internationally. These proposals tend to focus on collaborative models of cooperation between general practitioners and government funded health departments. In these models, services provided to individuals include both preventive activities such as immunisation and cervical screening, and treatment of infectious diseases. Additionally, GPs are being asked to provide services including participation in surveillance systems, managing divisional projects that promote health and, in some instances, advising on resource distribution to address health needs.6,8 Public health and general practice have the potential to complement each other by working collaboratively; however, there are barriers that limit this approach. True collaboration requires agreement from all parties as to their respective functions. In order to do this, GPs need to understand the roles and functions of other disciplines.