Government Intervention in American Dermatology

Continuing Medical Education (CME), Health Maintenance Organization (HMO), Disease Related Groups (DRG): a series of regulatory events have been initiated in the guise of improving quality of care. In reality, their purpose was to decrease the cost of care in many instances by decreasing care. How has this sorry and steady state arrived? Largely, we feel this has resulted from problems in communication. The physician should not only educate patients on the medical aspects of their disease, but also provide patients with the best information on adverse effects of political/social medicine. Within the past decade, American dermatology has witnessed a monsoon of alphabet soup that would make Franklin Roosevelt's New Dealers seem like kindergarteners groping for new letters. Although every evil has some good attached to it, ever so minute, the benefits, if any, must be miniscule. We have begun to wonder how many intellectual man-hours have been squandered, how many patient care hours have been lost, and how many wasteful dollars have been spent in implementing this potpourri of characters.