Doctor Shortage 'Disaster Threat'

The growing shortage of doctors in Michigan and the nation "threatens to reach disaster proportions," the president-elect of the Michigan State Medical Society said last night. "If we are going to merely stand still insofar as the ratio of physicians to population is concerned we are going to have to come up with about a third more new doctors each year - and this is a minimum estímate," added Dr. Robert J. Mason of Birmingham, co-chairman of the Michigan Citizen's Commission on Medical Education. He was among those addressing business and labor leaders, physicians and representatives of other groups from throughout southeastern Michigan at a conference on the doctor shortage. It was held in Bloomfield Hills under sponsorship of the society. Participants f rom this area were Dr. Harold F. Palls, U-M professor of ophthalmology; Dr. Howard E. Williams, Washtenaw County Medical Society president; Dr. Edwin. H. Place, president-elect of the county society; Wiïïiam Bott, Ann Arbor Chamber of Commerce manager; Mrs. Dorothy Walker, United Auto Workers union secretary; and B. W. Baldwin of the General Motors Corp. Hydra-Matic División at Willow Run. Dr. Mason said that even ta begin to keep up with the demand for doctors in Michigan! "we need to immediately exj pand the enrollment of öur existing medical schools in the state, and to expand the present two-year program at Michigan State University to a fouryear degree-granting program. "Each year the Michigan State Medical Society House of Delegates has called for action. Again, this September, we resolved to urge Michigan's governor and State Legislature to proceed with the job of bringing medical education facilities at the U-M, Wayne and MSU to full potential function. "Meeting the demand for properly trained physicians is everybod y's business. Lay groups should be established which would take it upon themselves to join MSMS in urging the necessary legislative financial support to bring about this result." Warren M. Huff of Plymouth, MSU trustee, said, "Even today we would be in a crisis state if it were not for the immigration from other states and foreign lands in the health field." According to Herbert Auer, society public information officer, more than a third of the new doctors practicing in Michigan have come here from other nations. "Michigan during recent years has licensed about 1,000 new doctors, with about 400 of them from forèign countries," he said. "It is a disgrace that the United States must keep up its supply of physicians by getting them from other countries," Huff commented. . On the question of the shortage of general practitioners and getting more medical students to enter general practice, the U-M professor said, "Why don't you invite senior medical students into your homes and communities to see what life is like for the general practitioner and what kind of schools he will have to send his children to. "They are scared to death that they won't be able to give their children a proper education" if they don't specialize and stay in the cities. Dr. Ernest Gardner, dean of the Wayne State University Medical School, said that "general practice residencies have not succeeded in attracting more people into general practice." Establishing programs like the one at Duke University in which armed services medical corps men who have had front line medical experience in Viet-I nam are given two years of training as physician's assistants, was discussed at the meeting. "It is hoped that within the next couple of years we willl have a four-year program ofl this kind in Michigan," a so-I ciety representative said.