Since I am apparently now considered a senior member of our specialty, a fact with which I have not yet become comfortable, I am permitted, and in some circles expected, to begin to share my perspectives and points of view with my younger colleagues. Those of you who know me recognize that I have not waited until my “senior status” to exercise this “rite of passage.”
The concern I wish to present to you in this brief time is the apparent change in the focus of our profession as a whole and our specialty toward the delivery of health care. This may be less complex and medically challenging than discussing diagnosis and treatment, and probably less stimulating, but I refer to the alteration in perspective of physicians regarding the time one should commit to the practice of medicine.