One way to increase cooperation between the professions of law and medicine is to teach law in medical schools in a way that emphasizes methods of approaching problems, and seeks to dispel the major myths that doctors have about the law. In this Article, Professor George Annas presents an outline of a core course in legal medicine “tailor-made” for inclusion in the medical (and, with appropriate modifications, dental) school curriculum.

This Article by Professor Arnold J. Rosoff concerns the passage of the Health Maintenance Organization Act of 1973, the problems which have been experienced thus far in its implementation, and the current proposals for amendment of the Act in order to make it more viable.

This Article examines the legal status of hospital committee proceedings and reports, focusing on how they may be used in a medicolegal context. Specific topics dealt with include the hospital medical staff in legal perspective, the concept of institutional responsibility, liability considerations arising from committee work, and the discovery and admissibility of committee records in litigation cases. The author concludes that the danger of committee members facing liability for their activities is slight and that the fear that these reports and proceedings may be subject to discovery or be admissible into evidence in subsequent litigation is remote because candid and conscientious evaluations of clinical practices within every institution are essential and, therefore, public policy must encourage such evaluations by maintaining the confidentiality of committee activities.

Today, it is readily apparent that the legal and moral aspects of medical practice are becoming increasingly complex. This is not to say that the practitioners of, say, twenty years ago did not face complex legal and ethical questions. Certainly they did. But for them, such questions were not raised in such diverse ways as they are today.