have submitted reports relating to medical research, education, and practice. From these and other reports4-6 one learns of studies of the preparation of students for medicine, selection procedures, curricular designs, assessment of student performance, teaching methods, internship, and graduate resident training programs. One may learn, too, of experiments in health service plans and of attempts to assess operationally the physician's job.7-9 There is growing recognition and understanding that medicine, or more broadly health science, is intimately and relevantly involved in and with the society in which it exists and which it serves.