Physiological considerations about life cycles of universities.

In Austria, a new federal law concerning university reorganization (UG 2002) has led to the former university medical faculties in Vienna, Innsbruck and Graz becoming independent medical universities, despite warnings by competent persons that this could have negative consequences. One logical consequence for example, is a certain isolationist trend that will eventually lead to medicine withdrawing into a kind of "splendid isolation", physically separated, even, from the rest in brand new buildings. The splitting of each of the three Austrian universities, which included Medical Faculties, into a new Medical University and a 'Rest University', has led to the growth of two daughter cells each now larger in terms of administration than the former university. The historical development of universities in Europe has seen times of affluence and times of decline. The recent new laws will for a long period have a marked impact on medicine and on the Medical Universities.