The academic medical center: a stressed American institution.

In recent years, relations between academic medical centers and the government have become increasingly adversarial. Although the centers and the government were formerly partners in a number of health ventures, to the mutual benefit of both, the climate is now too often confrontational. It is a confrontation in which there will be no winners, but the larger society may be the loser. A number of pressures on academic centers have helped to contribute to this situation. The federal sector and academic medical institutions must understand one another better and rediscover effective ways to preserve the special strengths of academic medicine in this country.