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>HEW officials have stated that the U.S. currently has a shortage of some 50,000 physicians. The American Medical Association disagrees. Reporting in the A.M.A. Journal on the results of a yearlong study of medical manpower, Henry Mason of the association's department of undergraduate medical education concludes that the problem is not scarcity but uneven distribution. In South Dakota, for example, there is only one internist for every 12,813 people. In 18 states, there is only one pediatrician for each 20,000. Obstetrician-gynecologists are also unevenly distributed; while the national median is 1 to 11,915, the ratio in ten states is only 1 to 20,000. There is also some overabundance, for example, one general surgeon for every 7,554 people in the U.S. today. (By contrast, the optimum general-surgeon-to-population ratio in prepaid group health plans ranges from 1 to 10,000 to 1 to 17,000.) Thus simply training more doctors will not solve the nation's medical dilemma. Instead, as an A.M.A. editorial states, medical schools should persuade more students to forgo glamour specialties like surgery in favor of those in which they can be better employed.

-- Metaphysics aside, just how dirty is money? Filthy indeed, according to a report by two doctors at the University of Louisville School of Medicine. Writing in the A.M.A. Journal, Drs. Berel Abrams and Norton Waterman report that money carries copious quantities of potentially harmful bacteria. They base their conclusion on analysis of 150 coins worth $13.47 and 50 bills totaling $150. The coins were relatively clean; only 13.3% yielded common bacteria like Staphylococcus. But 42% of the bills carried that type as well as Escherichia coli. To avoid contamination by cash, the Louisville researchers suggest that people get rid of their money rapidly, something that few have trouble doing today. In order to continue their research, the doctors have agreed to accept and examine any currency sent them--and to safely dispose of all found to be tainted.

>Cancer of the inner lining of the uterus (the endometrium) can usually be cured if it is diagnosed early enough. But that is a big if. The simple Pap smear, which is effective for detecting cancer of the cervix (neck of the uterus), cannot always pick up endometrial cancer. Dilatation and curettage, used to obtain cells from the uterine lining for analysis, requires hospitalization and is impractical unless the disease is already suspected. By then it may be too late; endometrial cancer kills about 3,500 American women a year. The Gravlee Jet Washer, a new device now being marketed by the Upjohn Company, gives physicians a less complicated way to get samples of endometrial cells. A disposable syringe attached to a soft plastic tube, it is used to introduce a saline solution into the uterus, then to draw the liquid out. Cells from the uterine lining carried out in the solution can then be analyzed microscopically. Tested on 305 patients at the University of Chicago's Lying-in Hospital, the washer proved simple and painless enough to be used in a physician's office. In all but seven cases, the samples were adequate for testing.

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