Medical costs crisis: Part 1. Doctors as culprits, victims--and keys to the solution.

Although the rising cost of US medicine actually reflects the "good news" about the improved quality and availability of health care today, physicians are increasingly being pressed to achieve cost containment. The causes of the problem are identified as supply-and-demand factors that have been obscured during more economically abundant periods, but that now are forcing reevaluation of such accepted practices as fee-for-service payment. Evaluation of these factors leads to suggestions for measures that could help to reduce costs.