The truth of the matter is that the practice of medicine is intensely personal and no system or machine can be substituted for the personal relationship. The proper interpretation of symptoms involves not only a comprehension of the causes of symptoms but also of the person in whom the symptoms arise. Every experienced physician knows that when one of his patients complains of a pain in the stomach it is probably a very trivial matter and when another makes apparently the same complaint it is probably a very serious matter. It all depends on the type of patient, and the better the physician knows his patient the better will he be able to decide on the proper treatment. Skilled physicians, gifted with peculiar insight into human nature, can often estimate a personality with remarkable accuracy in a few minutes or even seconds, but in general the more a doctor knows of his patient’s background the greater advantage he has in handling the case. That is the great advantage which the general practitioner has always possessed and still possesses. He knows the patient from childhood up--his physical health, the nervous and mental strain to which he has been subjected, the conditions of his social, business and domestic life, and, more even than this, he may have the same detailed knowledge of the patient’s parents and of the circumstances of their lives. Now all this kind of information, which is difficult to obtain except as the result of years of intimacy, has an infinitely important bearing on the question of health and disease. Not to have it is an enormous loss, and the loss falls, of course, primarily on the patient. He is the one who suffers. The only person who can really gather together this fundamental knowledge of his patients is the general practitioner. In the trend toward specialism the pendulum is swinging too far, and it is the duty of medical educators and leaders to indicate to their students the importance of general practice and the high professional attainments that are necessary for success in it. But this alone will not suffice. In the last analysis it is the attitude of the public which will determine the careers of many of our future medical men. If the public will but realize that it can have no greater asset than a close and continued personal relationship with a wise, sound, general adviser, it may rest assured that there will always be an adequate response to the call for service. In order to get the best type of medical men to turn to general practice, however, it is necessary for the public to understand that the qualifications for general practice are at least as high as those which are requisite for specialism, and to appreciate that the general practitioner is worthy of its respect and confidence. THE CARE OF THE PATIENT