Healing the Schism: Epidemiology, Medicine, and the Public's Health

The term schism has been used more than once by leaders in both public health and medicine to describe the increasing separation of the two fields in the past decades. Kerr L. White argues that this illogical separation diminishes their combined scientific, organizational and institutional potentials. His book proposes the thesis that the population perspective and concerns for the public's health should be reintegrated into the clinical departments of medical schools where they once flourished. Much of the author's work was in conjunction with the Rockefeller Foundation's Health of Populations program and the International Clinical Epidemiology Network (INCLEN). His book reviews the reasons behind the neglect of public health, the institutionalization of the schism, the evolution of concepts for improving public health and the creation of INCLEN.