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F. Douglas Scutchfield, MD; Regina Benjamin, MD, MBA

JAMA. 1998;279:1915-1916.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text and any section headings.

This issue of THE JOURNAL includes 2 articles on physician discipline that add substantially to the knowledge base about this important, yet disturbing phenomenon. The first article, by Dehlendorf and Wolfe,¹ uses a national database to examine trends and characteristics of 761 physicians who had disciplinary orders for sexual misconduct entered from 1981 through 1996 by a state or federal agency. The authors found that the proportion of all disciplinary orders taken against physicians that were sex related increased significantly, from 2.1% in 1989 (47 orders involving 42 physicians) to 4.4% in 1996 (154 orders involving 147 physicians), that 75% of sex-related offenses involved patients, and that disciplinary action for sex-related offenses was more severe than discipline for other offenses. In the second article, Morrison and Wickersham² examine information on 375 physicians disciplined over an 18-month period by the California State Medical . . . [Full Text of this Article]

From the Center for Health Services Management and Research, University of Kentucky Medical Center, Lexington (Dr Scutchfield); and the Bayou La Batre Rural Health Clinic, Bayou La Batre, Ala, and the University of South Alabama School of Medicine, Mobile (Dr Benjamin). Dr Benjamin is a member of the American Medical Association Board of Trustees, a Fellow of the Federation of Medical Licensing Boards, and a Member of the Alabama State Board of Medical Examiners.

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