I agree with the authors’ sentiments in this letter1 and, while there are some who feel that preventive and public health activity is displacing core general practice work, I’d reiterate the 2024 figures on competition ratios for specialty training — noting that the General Practice and Public Health Medicine ST1 (Dual CCT Programme) led all training programmes in competition ratio at 112 applications per place.2
The fact that there exists a dual specialty framework and an RCGP framework for developing an extended role in Population Health3 highlights that there are overlapping areas of function, knowledge, and expertise across these two specialties with a clearly increasing appetite among current and incoming doctors. Since publication of the letter the Population Health Fellowships have also come back online for recruitment.4
I also agree with the authors that communication and collaboration between general practice and the local public health team should be better. As an academic GP registrar and public health scholar in a local authority public health team, I have seen the value that I can provide by bringing the clinician’s viewpoint, pointing out where duplication of efforts and silos still exist, and therefore where there are opportunities for collaboration. I have also learnt a lot about leadership in a complex system, project management, and mass communication — all transferable skills for the GP considering partnership, a clinical director role, or a PCN-wide/ICB-wide leadership role. These are skills that I wouldn’t have developed if purely focusing on the GP registrar curriculum.
- © British Journal of General Practice 2025