On a Meeting for and About General Internal Medicine

General internal medicine is alive and well! The evidence for this exuberant pronouncement was clearly displayed at a comprehensive and well designed conference held last December in Miami, Fla, titled The Role and Training of the General Internist. Co-chaired by Drs Jay Sanders and Leonard Gardner of the University of Miami, the conference consisted of a number of carefully prepared keynote presentations, followed by a series of small group discussions. Over 350 physicians attended, and the major feature of all of the sessions was the striking enthusiasm of the participants.

The questions that were addressed are exactly the ones most general internists have pondered and worried over for the past several years: Is general internal medicine really a discipline? What is the proper balance between generalist and subspecialty interest for the internist in practice? Is there a substantial difference between the new-styled family practitioner and the general internist? How much