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Definitions are offered for quality of health care, reasonable costs or fees, an appropriate share of the dermatologic market, and reasonable income or profit for dermatologists. Physician control of these items was almost complete in the recent past, but control is now passing rapidly to government in the form of regulations and to large health care corporations in the form of unbridled competition in the marketplace. Physicians, including dermatologists, must mobilize and unite to retain reasonable controls, especially over quality care and personal income. The Academy (as an organization of all of us) can help in this process, but individual dermatologists at local, regional, and national levels must play major roles in retention of controls.

A persistent shortage of full-time faculty exists in dermatology. Despite the addition of 124 new full-time faculty since 1971 through 1972, 136 training programs in 1974 through 1975 were actively seeking 88 new full-time faculty and believed they needed 243. With a net gain of 30 new faculty a year, it will take 2.93 years to add 88 new faculty that are being actively sought and 5.16 years to add 155 more that are urgently needed. During this eight years, demand for new faculty will increase, so that figures of need may remain essentially unchanged in 1982 through 1983 and between 1971 through 1972 and 1974 through 1975. Expertise that was most needed was in immunology, electron microscopy, histopathology, microbiology, and biochemistry; many accept faculty in any area or with no special training. Measures should be taken to attract and retain more dermatologists in full-time academic positions.