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OLiR PRESENT CHALLENGES WILLIAM A. JEFFERS, M.D.* Medicine is a challenging and rewarding profession; it allows not only the thrill of finding new facts and relationships, but offers also to the physician the privilege ofsaving human lives through hisjudicious application of them. The Life Insurance Medical Research Fund has for the past twenty years been a force in the conquest ofillness. It has served as a liaison between the leaders in medicine and those in life insurance in the struggle against disability and premature death. The Fund has been a pervasive, positive influence upon medical progress by virtue of the scientists who have been associated with it in various capacities. Through these men it has shared in most ofthe important discoveries made in medicine during the past two decades. Measures for the prevention and control ofmany serious infections have been discovered during the existence of the Fund. The excitement of current endeavors may lead us to forget the importance to health of the successful conquests over these killers of youth. Table ? reflects much research into the causes, prevention, and cure oflethal diseases. More curative drugs have been discovered in the past twenty-five years than in the whole previous history ofmedicine. Research during these years has given us antibiotics; has expanded many times our knowledge of the value and uses of blood transfusion; has made possible the daily occurrence ofsurgery ofthe heart and lung; has led to notable advances in the field of anesthesia, making such delicate surgery possible; has given us new methods oftreating those with mental illness; has given us the blood bank, the bone bank, the eye bank, the blood-vessel bank; has made it possible to save lives with the artificial kidney; has shown us how to save premature babies and how careful we should be ofthe eyes of babies when we use oxygen; has given us the Cobalt 60 therapy unit; tells us ofthe effects ofnoise ofthejet aircraft and ofcertain industries on the human ear; has given us a potent weapon against poliomyelitis; and is our tool in the fight against cancer [1]. * Dr. Jeffers was Scientific Director, Life Insurance Medical Research Fund, 1030 East Lancaster Avenue, Rosemont, Pennsylvania 19010. He became ill suddenly in August and died September 29, 1965. 250 William A. Jeffers · Our Present Challenges Perspectives in Biology and Medicine · Winter 1966 The traditional emphasis ofthe Fund upon the search for fundamental causes has yielded rich returns. Empirical treatments have been replaced by specific measures derived from increasingly better understanding of life processes. TABLE 1 Achievements for the Control and Cure of Common Forms of Infectious Diseases* Disease Diphtheria...... Gonorrhea ...... Influenza ....... Leprosy ........ Malaria ........ Measles ........ Meningitis...... Plague.......... Pneumonia ...... Poliomyelitis. . . . Rabies ......... Rheumatic fever. Scarlet fever. . . . Smallpox ....... Syphilis ........ Tetanus ........ Tuberculosis. . . . Typhoid fever. . . Typhus fever. . . . Whooping cough. Year Cause Discovered 1884 1885 1933 1872 1880 1938 1887 1894 1884 1909 1884 ? 1878 1887 1905 1889 1882 1884 1916 1908 Prevention Available for Widespread Use (e.g., Vaccination ) + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + Potent Curative Drugs or Sera Available + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + * The discovery of causes many years ago is in contrast with the finding of specific drugs, through research done chiefly since 1935. Effective preventive measures are at hand for 15 of the 20 infections listed ; curativedrugs willcombat 16. A Formulafor Success The Fund has chosen a trustworthy formula for aiding scientific research : select the intellectually gifted scientist who wishes to explore fundamental problems; allow him the means to work according to his own unique capabilities; minimize routine tasks that may rob him ofhis creativity . Is this too much to give to those who are among the most productive in today's society? We think not. The achievements ofFund-aided scientists support the formula. 251 The Meaning ofMedical Science We areinfriendly competitionwith agenciesfor the support ofresearch in the physical sciences such as chemistry, physics, and mathematics. The boundaries ofthese fields are not rigid, nor should they be. Most of the medical students enrolled as Fellows ofthe Fund have chosen to gain intensive experience in the physical sciences as a part oftheir training. The whole purpose ofmedical science is the enrichment ofhuman life and the prevention ofsuffering and disability. The Fund was established in 1945 to aid in this endeavor. Despite the growth ofscientific...

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