The Definitive Account

 
enneth M. Ludmerer offers what he hopes will serve as the definitive account of the history of medical education in this country in Time to Heal: American Medical Education from the Turn of the Century to the Era of Managed Care (Oxford University Press). Early reports indicate he’s achieving his goal. The Association of American Medical Colleges is planning a series of conferences based on the volume to generate ideas for strengthening medical education in the 21st century.

Ludmerer, a professor of both history and medicine at Washington University, also wanted to describe the disturbing effects of recent trends in the medical marketplace on teaching, research and patient care.

The book’s beginnings took place at Johns Hopkins, the author makes clear, because it was here that he received both his M.A. in the history of medicine and his M.D. Ludmerer spent months in the Alan Mason Chesney Medical Archives going through material that helped shape his view of the background of medical teaching. As he probed, he came upon a huge collection of minutes from meetings of early faculty and administrators at the School of Medicine. He also found notes by former deans and trustees and records of student activity. Taken altogether, he says, the information “painted a picture.”

“I found that events at Johns Hopkins throughout the 20th century represented forces in American medicine as a whole,” Ludmerer says. “It is surpassed by nowhere in the world, and that’s reflected in the records.”