Medical practice involves a great deal more than treating individual patients. It has intimate connections with sociology and ethics, public health, professional and interpersonal relationships, economics, political philosophy, and many "nonscientific" branches of knowledge. The present book recognizes the importance of these aspects and provides a systematic coverage. The volume is in no way a text. It is an expanded and well-fleshed outline, which in part indicates the current problems and in part provides factual information.
The book has two major divisions. The first, "The Practice of Medicine," indicates how diverse are the activities of physicians. There are many different patterns of medical practice; licensing requirements are quite varied, as are the problems of accreditation. The health professions have an amazing complexity, and without the accessory personnel, modern medicine could not exist. The book presents formal expressions of medical ethics and what constitutes proper or improper behavior. It discusses hospital