Dissatisfaction With HMO Care

After years of silence, the public is finally awakening to the truth about managed care (“Survey Finds Wide Distrust of HMO Care,” Nov. 6). What this survey reveals is what doctors and other health care providers have long known: HMOs, in their incessant quest for ever greater profits, have reduced the profession of medicine to little more than a service industry. The full implications for the nation of this transformation won’t be fully felt for years to come. By then it will be too late to matter.

WALT GARDNER

Los Angeles

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* To those who feel the managed care industry has improved the quality and reduced the cost of health care: You must appreciate the 13-ounce “pound” of coffee, the durability of “improved” razor blades and the “savings” in the cost of cable television brought about by deregulation. “It’s the profit, stupid.”

RICHARD P. FOX MD

Tustin

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* The bottom line about the dissatisfaction of the majority of HMO patients with their medical care is that profits and good medical care are incompatible.

SOL LONDE MD

Northridge