The article comes from one written by Muir Gray about the
situation on England, though there are expected to be lessons for Wales as the
networks develop. In a speech to the Faculty of Public Health Medicine, last
November, Lord Hunt talked both about public health networks and a Public Health
Network.
“The purpose of the network will be to pool expertise and
skills in specialist areas of public health which can then be available to all
PCTs, share good practice, and manage public health knowledge and, very
importantly, act as a source of learning and professional development”.
The local networks will arise by common agreement among
public health departments, both academic and service, both NHS and local
authority, the organisations in which they are based, and individual public
health professionals who wish to work in a network. However, the development of
local public health networks also offers the opportunity of creating a single
national network.
How else can one find a colleague who knows about, for
example, supporting refugees from Kosova, sustainable transport policies,
screening for renal cancer, or any one of the host of other issues which public
health has to cover.
Public health networks offer public health professionals not
only support but also the opportunity for developing their special skills and
interests and for finding work and paid employment.
Knowledge is the enemy of disease. For public health this is
particularly important because public health professionals rarely make technical
interventions like the drugs or operations of the physician or surgeon. Alan
Milburn announced the need to create a National Knowledge Service in Learning
from Bristol and this requires:
-
An integrated knowledge base for the domain, in this case
public health;
-
A single network of organisations – service
departments, academic departments and local networks;
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The creation of virtual teams of individuals who do not
work face to face but who are members of a community tackling a particular
public health problem;
-
A technical infrastructure that allows all of these to
operate and interact with other parts of e-government.
Three projects are under way to facilitate the creation of
the Public Health Network:
A project to integrate the various knowledge bases of public
health, e.g. the Public Health Observatory, the Public Health electronic
Library, and specialised websites such as that of the Public Health Laboratory
Service and the National Screening Committee.
The development of common standards for public health
departments and, particularly, local networks. The worst option would be for
each Public Health Network to go out and buy their own copy of Dreamweaver or
Front Page. With only a few simple rules for interaction a network can be
created.
Perhaps the last of these projects will be most challenging.
The number of jobs in public health departments is still unclear. The amount of
work to be done is immense and encouraging public health professionals who wish
to work, or who have to work, outside the confines of a public health
department, either whole time or part time, can at the one time provide a
satisfying life for individuals and solve the capacity problem of public health.
