“Dr.” Smith Goes to Washington?
In an election year, attention inevitably is drawn to the presidential contest,
but American doctors should pay special note to the Congressional races. All
435 seats in the U.S. House of Representatives are in play every two years,
and that is where the financial legislation that affects us all usually begins.
We hear a good deal about socioeconomic issues at our meetings, and we have
set up political action committees to influence Congressional decision-making.
Beyond that, is there a role for neurosurgeons in the political process?
Around the world there are practicing doctors, past and present, who have attained great political prominence. Charles Tupper, MD, of Nova Scotia was active for many years in Canadian politics, and became prime minister (for 69 days, the shortest tenure in Canadian history) in 1896. Jivraj Mehta, MD, studied medicine in London and ultimately was the chief minister of the state of Gujarat in India. The current foreign minister of France and the president of Syria are physicians. And Jacques Brotchi, longtime chair of neurosurgery at the Erasmus Hospital in Brussels, is a senator in Belgium.
American doctors have not reached these political heights. But in the first century of the U.S. Congress they accounted for 4.6 percent of members. Of 56 signers of the Declaration of Independence four were physicians, as were two of the 55 framers of the Constitution. Doctors in Congress in 2008 are a small minority, numbering seven representatives and no senators since cardiac surgeon Bill Frist retired in 2006. Between 1960 and 2004, physicians accounted for just 1.1 percent of Congress (and about 0.3 percent of the population). This may seem unsurprising, given how the professional demands of a medical career make a run for office seem impossible. Neurosurgery is a relatively young specialty, and a neurosurgeon has not yet held a seat in Congress (although not for lack of trying-there have been occasional candidates over the years). The highest office held by an American neurosurgeon is that of lieutenant governor of Nevada (Lonnie Hammargren) in the 1990s.
Time magazine published an article in 1939 describing the opposition of the New York Medical Society to federally funded, compulsory health insurance (sound familiar?). A dinner was held to rally support against the proposal, a part of Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal that never did become law. The article concludes by noting that “the majority of Manhattan physicians, congenitally afraid of politics… went about their business, blissfully ignorant of the whole affair.” In our era of increasing governmental involvement in reimbursement and management of medical services, ignorance (blissful or otherwise) is a luxury we can ill afford. Doctors in general, and that includes neurosurgeons, should seek political office to advance the interests of our patients, our profession, and society as a whole.
Michael Schulder, MD, is vice chair of the Department of Neurosurgery and director of the Harvey Cushing Brain Tumor Institute at the North Shore Long Island Jewish Health System, Manhassett, N.Y. The author reported no conflicts for disclosure. Send topic ideas for Timeline to Dr. Schulder at [email protected].