1 Chief, Division of Hematology-Oncology, Children's Hospital, Medical Center, Boston, Massachusetts
Though the tone of some of the responses to my commentary is a bit more strident than I would hope to hear in a discussion among colleagues, I must admit that some of the criticisms are well taken.
There are one or two points that require closer examination. First, it is not fair to blame the overgrowth of specialty and research medicine on the department chairmen of the 50s. The facts are that organized medicine made certain that no funds would be available to develop new primary care programs aside from traditional residency training programs.