[Medical-scientific societies, quality control and disfunctional physicians]

One doctor denied an existing fatal malignancy and diagnosed cancer in patients who did not have it. He and two other doctors gave the impression that they could cure patients by methods of which the efficacy has not been demonstrated. All three were members of a society for alternative medicine; two of them no longer are. The third, an internist, is still a member of his alternative scientific medical society, but of the Netherlands Association of Internal Medicine as well. A clinical chemist with a private laboratory that continually diagnoses nutritional deficiencies in a disputable way, and a neurologist who cooperates with a highly controversial American back physician were not expelled from their associations nor corrected by them. The Dutch Health Inspectorate is investigating dysfunctioning physicians and may well take action against them. The medical-scientific societies could well pay closer attention to their task of promoting the quality of the professional activities of their members.