Exploring the roles of Korean public health doctors in the development of Korean medicine health promotion project

Objectives : In an effort to suggest a developmental plan of Traditional Korean Medicine health promotion project(TKM-HPP), this study was conducted to identify the problems experienced by public health Traditional Korean Medicine(PH-TKM) doctors in duty and to analyze successful cases of the health promotion project. Methods : Two PH-TKM doctors in duty at the Public Health Centre branch and Public Health Centre respectively, and one TKM doctor in charge of Public Health Centre participated in the in-depth interview. The research procedure was as follows; 1) inform study objectives and interview questions to participants, 2) in-depth interview with semi-structured questions, and 3) post-confirmation and verification. The interview was recorded and transcripted. In-depth interview was composed of 6 subsections: 1) Introducing participants and share purpose of interview, 2) Confirmation of the job status and difficulty of public health centre, 3) Reflecting and sharing experiences of public health clinic job performance cases, 4) Current status and improvement needs of TKM-HPP, 5) Discussions on improvement of TKM-HPP in public health center, 6) Sharing and reconfirmation of interview results. Thematic analysis was conducted from the narratives. Results : The study showed that; 1) the support from the local government was critical for the successful TKM-HPP and participation of the PH-TKMs; 2) the major problems experienced by PH-TKMs were lack of training for TKM-HPP in the field and lack of knowledge at local government level; 3) the suggestions to provide PH-TKMs with manual to educate residents effectively and redefine roles of PH-TKMs in the project. It also suggests that TKM-HPP model should be developed by the district in a way of reflecting regional characteristics. Conclusions : Firstly, more efforts should be made on the projects rather than medical treatment in public health centers, except for areas where medical institutions are scarce. Secondly, in order to facilitate participation of PH-TKM doctors, each local office should reduce medical care and increase efforts related with projects. Thirdly, the institution has to develop feasible TKM-HPP plans that can be carried out by PH-TKMs by the manual. Lastly, pre-training should be provided to PH-TKMs to understand contents of TKM-HPP related to public health centre work before the placement.

한의약건강증진사업 발전을 위한 공중보건한의사 역할 탐색