[roentgen]

We see things differently.

Radiology is a very difficult field to get into after medical school, something like 2/3 of American grads who apply get turned away. Additionally, for those who get in, up to 1/3 never pass all the board exams. It almost seems like you want to lower the bar, and I'm telling you it needs to be raised.

My guess is that if your system was developed and worked, the intelligence and drive required to complete it, the time spent studying and working to become competent in radiology would end up being no different than the current system. There are no short cuts.

[timr]

"Radiology is a very difficult field to get into after medical school, something like 2/3 of American grads who apply get turned away."

I don't agree with kenjackson that the field can be self-taught, but saying that most people don't get into Radiology residencies tells me only that there aren't enough Radiology residencies to go around. The 1/3 board failure rate notwithstanding, my intuition is that there are far more people capable of practicing radiology than are currently allowed to try to get into the field. The intelligence level of medical students does not exceed that of PhD students in engineering, math, chemistry, etc., but the medical profession puts up much, much higher economic barriers to entry.

If the government decided to tax radiology providers and use the profits to increase the number of radiology residencies by 10 or 100-fold, I find it hard to believe that the lucrative profit margins of your industry wouldn't decline. Medicare reimbursement rates would go down as the number of providers increased.

[kenjackson]

Radiology is a very difficult field to get into after medical school, something like 2/3 of American grads who apply get turned away. Additionally, for those who get in, up to 1/3 never pass all the board exams. It almost seems like you want to lower the bar, and I'm telling you it needs to be raised.

All you've said is that some tests aren't being passed. Can you correlate them with improved medical care? Again, in my alternate world, I can construct a CS test that 90% of those w/ undergrad CS degrees would fail. That's not hard to do. The question is "does my ability to pass such a test correlate with my ability to do a website?"

You're pointing to scarcity and arguing that this is proof that we require scarcity. I'm saying that if you dropped the bar on these tests, but increased other policing practices that yielded a net increase in the number of doctors, I think you'd see an increase in medical care. My thesis is purely speculative, I grant you that.

I suspect we're likely to find out if this does work out in non-US countries once as medical information and training becomes more prevalent on the web.

[roentgen]

You make some good points.

Of course, I cannot prove that the tests insure quality. In fact, this is not what the radiology board exam does.

The board exam is designed to weed out dangerous doctors, which is probably the best we can hope for. So, I guess you can take my word for it or not, but dropping the bar at all would let dangerous people practice, which I see as a mistake. The people that I know who failed the exam should not be working in Radiology.