The following is a summary of some of the major activities of the National Program for Dermatology during the past year and also a summation of some of the substantial challenges we face. It is anticipated that this will be a fair assessment of our present status. Consequently, emphasis will be placed not only on some of the notable successes, but also on a number of areas where we are currently remiss by virtue of our failure to have as yet developed a positive response to a clearly identifiable problem.
That we are being subjected to an increasing barrage of external pressures is clear when we look at some of the major health policy decisions that are currently under consideration by legislators and health administrators: national health insurance, maldistribution of physicians, influx of foreign medical graduates, peer review regulations and guidelines, medical specialty recertification, efforts to regulate the supply of