The Role of Medicine Within a Business Organization

The Council on Occupational Health of the American Medical Association has previously published "A Management Guide for Occupational Health Programs"¹ and the "Guide to the Development of Company Medical Policies."² These have proved useful not only to members of company managements but also to industrial physicians for defining the functions and advantages and for structuring the establishment of medical departments in industry. A previous basic publication, "Scope, Objectives and Functions of Occupational Health Programs,"³ set forth the professional principles, approved by the American Medical Association, on which such programs should be based, from the medical viewpoint. That document made clear that the occupational health program deals exclusively "with the health of employees in relation to their work and is largely preventive" and does not include a "medical care program for non-occupational illnesses and injuries."

More recently the Council has become aware of the fact that many physicians