The Physician's Fee: A Historical Reflection

Abstract

<p>This article examines one aspect of the current crisis in health care delivery: the role of the medical fee in the patient-physician relationship. In a single generation, the way patients relate to their physicians and the way the medical profession defines itself have undergone a drastic transformation. This change is largely the result of the new ways in which medical fees are paid, but the problem is more than a matter of finding adequate funding for the surging costs of modern, technically complex medicine.</p>