This study explores the current state of health communication research between the communication
and public health·medicine pharmacy area, utilizing a content analysis of 387 independent studies
published in major academic journals in Korea (2009∼2015). Based on the content analysis of article,
this study examines the characteristics of the research, the common health topics covered, the types of
research presented, research designs and samples used, and theories on which research is based. The
results of this study shows that communication-related journals published health communication
studies more diverse than the public health·medicine pharmacy journal in the topic of area. Within the
communication model‘s SMCRE(sender-message-channel-receiver-effect) components, most health
communication studies focused on the receiver(audience) component. Also, most studies are
performed by survey. Finally, this article discusses the differences and similarities of health
communication studies published in the area of communication and public health·medicine pharmacy,
with the implications of this study for the direction of future work.