Education: Medical & Liberal Arts

Medical schools are hard places to get into, and an undergraduate headed for one is likely to load himself with courses in the hard sciences and let the humanities go hang. The result: U.S. doctors, as conversationalists, are apt to be excellent physicians. But the climate of opinion in medical schools is changing. A report issued last week by Harvard University indicates that potential physicians need not insulate themselves from the liberal arts, and in some cases may hurt their chances by doing so.

Gist of the report, which studied the careers of 1,390 Harvard students who went on to medical school...