Is there a discipline of community medicine?

Community Medicine is a distinct and definable discipline. Through Community Medicine Departments of medical schools and hospitals, patient care, teaching and research programs are conducted in an integrated fashion, concerned with a broad definition of health which is beyond the range of other clinical departments. Because Community Medicine is a developing field, and Departments of Community Medicine are not rigidly tied to traditional approaches, there exist unusual opportunities for new design and fresh insight. Community Medicine is in the fore of Medicine's ability to evolve with the society around us. Community Medicine both identifies the need for change, and acts as an agent for the change. There are obstacles. The most difficult challenges we face are obtaining curriculum time for a new discipline which, to those caught in "the vice-like irrational grip of tradition" (18), may not appear worthy; and ridding ourselves of the sterotype that the hospital can be the single unified source of health care for all community people. These problems are being resolved, however, and the inherent value of community medicine as a new body of theory and practice becomes increasingly clear.