Better Doctors' Education Proposed by Yale Med Dean

Because he fears the "uncertainties" of the future of medical care, C. N. Hugh Long, dean of the Yale Medical School, came out this week for a widely-revised medical education system as the alternative to "vast health insurance plans."

In the annual report of the Yale Medical School, Long stated that medical education will have to adapt itself to a growing public belief that adequate medical care be provided for the people regardless of economic circumstances.

Health Insurance

But "promulgating vast compulsory or voluntary health insurance plans" is not the answer, Long feels, for medical is "only as good" as the physicians provided by the schools.

Yale's proposal, Long said, would be for the country's medical schools to stop "confining themselves to the classical forms of education."

Long would like to see a medical education system so arranged that students from liberal-arts colleges would be taken into medical school at the end of their sophomore year. "Some exceptional students might even he admitted upon graduation from high school," Long said.

Under his proposal the student would enter a revised three-year undergraduate program of general culture courses, regular pre-med training in the sciences, and courses in the medical sciences.

After further completing the final two years of the medical school program as it now exists, the student would receive his M.D. degre a year sooner than under the present system and three years sooner if he entered the program directly from high school.

Discussing finances, Long says that sooner or later med schools will have to receive additional support. "There may soon be no alternative to government assistance except a catastrophic reduction in our educational standards."